Juxtaposition
by Anotherjaneway
Summary: Roy DeSoto faces every father's nightmare when his son is trapped in a mudslide. The gang deals with child loss up close.


This is a text version of the original still airing imaged, music soundtracked story.

Emergency Theater Live, Episode Three

3. Juxtaposition, Season One, Episode 3

Short summary- Roy DeSoto faces every father's nightmare when his son is trapped in a mudslide. The gang deals with child loss up close.

****WARNING**** The long summary to come is very story spoiling and will take away plot surprises if you read it now before reading the longer story below it.

Decide now if you want to read this episode's detailed summary before doing so.

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Long Summary- Roy has feelings of dread during a rainy day. The station responds to a mudslide school bus accident. They rescue several students and the driver only to find a leg entrapped Chris DeSoto there as well. Marco nearly drowns in mud when the bus gets buried by another slide, entrapping Johnny, Roy, Chet and Marco inside of it. They meet a good luck charmed, miraculous fellow firefighter named Detello. DeSoto suffers a crisis when a child he loses down a storm drain's body is found the next day in the L.A. river bed. Chet takes Roy's place during a diabetic rescue on Johnny's orders. The station responds to a school fire and Roy makes a child rescue count with the assistance of the guardian angel like Detello.

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The Story Unfolds...

Season One, Episode Three..

Juxtaposition

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Debut Launch: 15 Dec 2002.

From: Fran Catrair Date: Sun Dec 15, 2002 11:57 pm Subject: Rainy Days and Mondays

It was a dreary, gray day in Southern California, with a hint of rain in the air. It was the kind of day that made the quiet Roy DeSoto even more reserved than normal, and he sighed in melancholy, not touching his breakfast.

His partner looked up at the sound and noticed his partner's troubled expression. The engine crew had left earlier on a call, but Cap had just radioed in, saying they would be back at the stationhouse shortly. For the moment, though, they had the place to themselves.

"What's wrong, Roy?" Johnny asked his dour partner. ::Like he's going to tell me.:: Johnny thought grimly. It had been like pulling teeth just to find out when Roy's birthday was. He had even asked Cap to pull a few strings at personnel for the information, but Cap had refused, saying if Johnny wanted to know when Roy's birthday was so badly, he should find out for himself.

Roy continued skating his fork around his plate, the sausage attached causing a nice track in the maple syrup left on his plate from his now just eaten pancakes. "Nothing, Johnny. Just thinking." Roy responded absently.

::Why am I NOT surprised?:: Johnny thought to himself in exasperation. He was about to try another tact when the station alarm klaxon sounded. Both men got up from the table quickly, sparing a moment to look at each other in concern. The longer klaxon meant the situation was not good.

##Squad 51...Engine 51...Batallion 8.  
overturned schoolbus....715 Dorchester Blvd...seven-one-five Dorchester Blvd.  
Cross street Hamilton...Time out...0827."

Johnny quickly jotted the information down on a piece of paper and reached for the station mic. ##Squad 51...KMG365.## he acknowledged.

Johnny immediately sprinted to the awaiting squad. As the garage door opened, both men looked out to see the cloudy morning had turned into a downpour. Grimly, Roy turned on the windshield wipers. As the squad left the dry stationhouse, he sighed again and said, "I hate rainy days.  
and Mondays!"

Photo: The Gang hanging around the apparatus bay by the squad.

Photo : The Intercom Speaker announcing a rescue.

*animated gif * : A flashing rack of red and white vehicle rescue lights.

*  
From : "Fran Catrair" Subject : [EmergencyTheaterLive] Mudslide Date : Thu, 19 Dec 2002 02:06:39 -0600

Johnny wordlessly looked out the window at the rain coming down around him. He glanced at his partner's grim expression and sighed quietly, looking back out the window. He was trying to think what Roy might be thinking. ::Kids okay...fight with Joanne?:: he wondered. Well, nothing he could do about it until after the call.

The squad's sirens continued to wail and Roy's face was almost unreadable. Until Cap's voice came out over the Station frequency. ##L.A., This is Engine 51. Is it known how many casualties might be involved?"##

"Roy, what's the matter?"

"Hmm?" Roy replied, still listening to the exchange between dispatch and their captain going over their radio.

The rain came down harder, making the road flood. Roy was forced to slow down and so did the engine behind them.

"What is it, Roy?", Johnny asked, more firmly this time.

Roy sighed and voiced his long held thoughts. "I've been having a feeling something bad was going to happen today. Just a feeling. My son was going to the Musuem of Natural History for a field trip today. They were to leave immediately this morning.", Roy finished, his voice shaky and tapering slightly.

Johnny was stunned by the news. "Maybe it's not their bus, Roy. I mean, how many schools must be having field trips today?", he said, trying to take his partner's mind off the worst.

"It's them," Roy said, quietly. "It's them."

Sam's voice came over the radio. #Engine 51...casualties unknown at this time. CHP is on the scene.#

Caps' voice came very fast. ##10-4, L.A. Our ETA is..... four minutes..##

Roy skidded a little too fast around a turn and the squad shimmied around a corner and almost fishtailed before he regained control.

John said. "Want me to drive? We can radio in to the Engine.. Tell em why.."

Roy looked firmly at John and shook his head vehemently. His face screwed up in concentration, as he willed the squad to go on. At last, they could see the scene in the distance.

The yellow Blue Bird cab was fully on its side and along the margin. The front end was buried deeply in slag from the rain soaked hillside.

"Mudslide!!" Johnny said. "Roy.. can you tell. Is it the same bus?"

"I don't know. I don't know...." Roy said.

Cap's voice filtered firmly into them as they pulled just behind the rear of the bus, pulling up so the squad was acting as a buffering obstacle between the bus and oncoming traffic.

##Squad 51. Stay right where you are. And enter the scene from there. Stoker pull ahead to the car and those power lines. Looks like they're down. L.A. Cut power to the north side of the freeway overpass at mile marker seventy four!##

A fierce bolt of lightning shot down from the dim sky and the rain came down in torrents as Johnny and Roy ran out of the squad's cab for their gear and extrication equipment.

They ran for the nearest thing they could see,  
the back of the bus and the emergency exit there.

##10-4, 51.##, dispatch responded.

Johnny and Roy could see the bus was rocking slightly. They knew with the rain coming down and the mud, the bus could be buried deeper, and rapidly. They needed to act fast.

"Cap, we're gonna need the K-12.. Looks like the rear hatch is jammed in here real good!" Roy said. He desperately tried to wipe away the mud and steam on the windows, but he could see nothing of the interior.

Johnny began shouting. "Can anybody hear me?! Fire department!!"

Weak high pitched screams met their ears and a bloody palm impacted the window right by Johnny's face.. ::Oh my G*d.::

Right next to him, Roy flinched.

Roy was trying to clear away the debris from the hatch to place the K-12 when he saw it. Number 62. He looked at Johnny. "Number 62. It's his bus.", he said.

Finally, Chet and Marco arrived with the K-12. They observed the tenseness of both paramedics.

"What's going on?" Chet demanded.

"Ohmyg*d, Johnny..".. Roy gasped. "I can't do this.." and he nearly fell to his knees.

Gage got on his HT. ##Cap! Stoker. On the double! We need man power now. Roy's kid is here!##

Chet opened his mouth and closed it, shocked. He and Marco quickly took the K-12 to the rear hatch. Both men had a look of determination on their faces. This rescue had become personal.

Captain Stanley ran, slipped and skidded in the mud until he grabbed the side of the bus to steady himself. "Gage, take over primary care triage. Roy, stay out here. And that's an order!"

Right then, the roar of water from a storm drain caved in a part of the road underneath the toppled bus and its side split open like a tin can, spilling a tiny body in a girl's skirt,  
onto the road and into the drain in a rush.....

Gage made a leap for the tiny feet but wasn't fast enough. Cap grabbed him first and said, "No!! Get a life line first! Now.. We don't know how deep it is in there!"

DeSoto ran for the squad to get one.

Roy sprinted to the right compartment, slipping and trying desperately to stay on his feet. Then he slid back to the back of the bus, wordlessly thrusting the lifelines at Cap and Johnny and tying one onto himself.

"Oh no! No!" Roy said, when the feet slipped again just as he grabbed for them. The tiny body disappeared in a rage of flooding brown water and was gone.

Johnny grabbed Roy's lifeline and secured it, proceeding back to the bus area. "Roy,  
there's nothing we can do! Get up! She's dead.."

---------

Gage approached the bus. Chet and Marco were beginning to check the victims closest to them. They knew they would need to free them first, but they needed to be sure it would be safe to move them.

Chet shouted. "Johnny. I got a probable skull fracture here. I got bleeding in the ears on this one.." he said, looking up, with a hand on the small boy's stomach.

Marco was speaking quietly with five others,  
telling them to hurry out to Cap who was gesturing to them. "Go to the tall man over there. He'll take care of you.."

----------------------------------------

Photo : Cap looking tense in helmet closeup.

Photo : Johnny in a storm drain with a child.

Photo : Roy and Johnny in full turnout by the engine.

*  
From : "Cassidy Meyers" Subject : Every Parent's Nightmare... Date : Fri, 27 Dec 2002 21:09:34 +0400

Captain Stanley had one eye on the kids Lopez had directed to him, the other, on Roy. "That's it.  
Come on out of the bus. Don't worry about fire.  
It's raining good out here..There's no way things are gonna burn." his voice said gently to them as he took them one by one by the arms and lifted them from the wreckage. When the last walking little girl was taken by a CHP, Cap turned to his HT. ##L.A. This is Engine 51. Respond a full landslide detail to our scene. The freeway's in danger of a mud avalanche.##

##10-4, 51.## and Cap sighed as he heard dispatch call out the run also to Station 10 and 114. He turned his attention to the long board Chet had laid out by his head injury's side and helped Lopez and Kelly secure and free the boy from his place underneath the seats.

Gage was already hyper paramedic mode. Only the slightest stress in his tone gave away the fear he felt still having Roy's son, among those not yet found.  
"Easy, Chet. Keep those sandbags on either side of his head. He's breathing fine. Hold it a sec, Just let me get this peds airway in." Johnny looked up. "Cap!"

"Yeah.." Stanley said, peeking through the ripped side of the upside down school bus over the rushing river of muddy water running down the curbside of the road. He didn't look at the sewer grate which had cost the little girl, her life.

"This next one's gonna need O2. Have a man hyperventilate him until I can get to him!" Johnny gasped, ducking around metal shards and debris.

"You got it pal.." Cap said. He looked up at Roy as two policemen in yellow rain gear took the tiny boy's longboard and got him out of the bus. "Roy.. Take him."  
he said, shaking the pouring rain off his helmet so he could see where Marco Lopez and Chet Kelly were working better.

"Huh?" Roy said, still dazed by his private nightmare.  
In his head, his own voice was screaming.  
::Chris? Where are you??! Ohmyg*d Chris! Be ok. Be ok! Johnny. You find him. Find him fast..:: he thought, but out loud . "Right.." he said. "Have him set over here, I'll take a look at him."

DeSoto got out a peds BP cuff and set it around Chet's victim's arm. He got a palpated brachial pulse of sixty.  
::Too slow.. D*mn. Brain stem head injury..:: The tiny comatose boy's unequal and fixed and abnormal eyes and his soaring BP confirmed the finding. "Keep tabs on his carotid, Ben." he told the CHP officer who knelt with the resuscitator Cap handed him. "Ventilate him 30 a minute on 100 % O2, ok? Time it to work with his inspirations."

"Got it.." the highway patrol officer said, setting the tank's smaller fitted mask over the boy's nose and mouth. He began using the thumb trigger.

Roy got on the phone to Rampart.  
"Rampart, this is squad 51. How do you read?"

His heart just about pounded out of his chest when it was Dixie who answered. "Go ahead,  
51. I read you loud and clear."

##Rampart. We have a multiple casualty situation. Car versus school bus. Triage is underway. So far,  
I've six victims. Five minor, one comatose.  
Victim one, a boy of six or seven. Under supported ventilation on 100 % O2. BP 142/110, pulse 60. Respirations, are in Cheynes Stokes pattern. He is immobilized with sandbags and a long board with an oral airway. There's no apparent trauma beyond a noticable depressed occipital softness at the base of his skull.##

Dixie wrote down Roy's vitals set and motioned for Dr. Early to come into the radio room. "Joe, it's 51. Sounds like a real bad one. And something else too,  
I've never heard Roy so uptight before."

"Oh?" Dr. Early toggled the intercom receiver. "51,  
on victim one, start an IV D5W TKO only. Maintain an airway, elevate his head, and transport as soon as possible." Then he licked his lips and asked, "Roy, just how serious is your situation?"

Joe's question took Roy aback when he realized that Dr. Early wasn't only referring to the boy they had stabilized.  
The doctor was going outside of protocol. ::Because he knows something's up..:: Roy reasoned mentally.

Roy replied. "You'll know the moment I do, doc. Wish I could tell you more. All I know is that we don't know a lot of details right now and there's at least one fatality."

Roy cringed when Mike Stoker ran up from the car that had caused the accident and the downed power poles. His coat wasn't even unbuttoned as it would have been had he found someone alive and revivable. "DeSoto.." Mike called out.  
"The victim in the car's a Code F. Looks like because of electrical shock. He's been down too long. Pupils are fixed and dialated and there's already lividity showing in his lower extremities."

"Got it, Stoker.." Roy said. Then he turned back to the phone. "Rampart, raise that number to two Code F. Victim one's loading with Squad 10. I estimate their ETA to you around ten minutes. Please stand by for further victims.."

##Standing by.## Joe said.

---------------------------------

Roy saw the Mayfair recede into the distance through the noisy rain down the highway and away from the scene of mud and multilated metal. He tried not to imagine the little girl who had drown down the drainage grate.

Inside the bus, the going was slow. Johnny felt bloody neck after bloody neck and found no signs of life.  
He gestured to Kelly. "Get those seats outta there.  
Forget these six, they're gone." Gage bent down to worm his way along the soaked floor to the next section of broken seats. More bodies and pieces of bodies. Nightmarish.. Then...

"Uncle J-Johnny?"

Gage's heart skipped a beat. "Chris?! Where are ya?  
Now don't move around. Just keep talkin to me.. Chet!  
I found him.. Give me your HT! "

Kelly underhand tossed it to Gage like a pro.  
Gage caught the heavy walkie talkie and thumbed it.  
"Squad 51 to Engine 51. Got another survivor.  
Hey Roy... Listenup..Ok, Chris.. Say something. Daddy's right outside." Gage said, handing the HT to the muddy blond headed boy cradled against his shoulder.

"I'm here. I'm ok. Don't worry Daddy. Just get the other kids out. I'm fine. Really.."

Outside, DeSoto let out a half sob of relief.  
"Chris??" Roy said, he ran for the bus.

Cap stopped him. "Hey hey hey.. Now listen.  
It's crowded enough with Kelly, Lopez and Gage in there. You're needed out here for triage. Hang tight, Roy. Things sound good to me.. and now even better in there for them..."

Roy stopped fighting Cap's hold and sagged against the bus's shell. Through a foggy window,  
he could see many many body sheets. "ohmyg*d."

"I know.. I know.." Cap said, grasping Roy by the face. "It's bad. That's why I didn't want you in there.  
Now just stick with your HT and no doubt Johnny will be letting you know how he is, ok? Hang tight and just wait here.." Stanley strode away to intercept 114 coming in, to direct them to deal with the mudslide risky hill that had already claimed part of the school bus.

Lopez shouted. "Hey somebody.. I need help. I found the school bus driver!"

Roy glanced around and saw Chet's caked shoes deep in the seats and two sets of flashlights but no one else handy. "I gotta do it.." Roy muttered and ducked into the bus. Immediately two from Engine 10 took his place outside the tear in the side of the bus to wait for orders for extrication equipment from those working inside.

Roy's breath caught deep in his throat when the smell of blood and things much worse reached his nose from the tiny bodies Chet and Johnny had covered.  
He began to fervently wish he had obeyed Cap's advice to stay outside. He forced his lips to work. "Marco,  
whatdiya got?"

"He's alive. Eviscerated partially. Looks like a piece of the dash stabbed him and tore out afterwards.  
Lower right quadrant. Also, this mud's caving in on him. He's having a lot of trouble breathing."

Lopez ducked as another gush of mud and branches from the hill slid through the shattered bus windshield and onto the driver's lap. He used his hands to scrape away the stuff from the man's nose and mouth and he bent close down to make sure air still moved effectively there.

Roy never got to see the wound Lopez spoke of.  
It was buried in mud instantly. He shouted over his shoulder and set his HT near his ear on an overturned seat back. "You guys, on the double. Shovels and a scoop stokes. This hill's gonna go!"

Roy listened closely to Johnny's heavy gasps and grunts as he and Chet maneuvered nearer to Chris through the tangle of shorn off seats even as his own hands assessed the driver. "We've got to get him out fast..Now. Long board or no long board. Marco..watch his airway!"

"I know.. This mud's crushing him.."

"Just keep him breathing.. even if he quits.."  
Roy said, leaning over to try and dig the muck away from the driver's lower half with only his gloved hands. The mud flowed in faster than he could push it away.

Marco groaned in frustration and renewed his jaw lift on the unconscious man with one hand and felt his chest with the other. "So far so good. He's still here."

Roy continued to free the driver.

Chet Kelly put on his best smile.

It didn't fool Chris. Something was filling all of his thoughts beyond getting out to Roy.  
"Uncle Johnny. I tried.. I tried so hard.. Ahh!" he grimaced, when Gage's questing hands found where his leg was pinned in a knot of seat. "Yeah, Uncle Johnny, right there. My knee I think. But listen to me.. ugh.. I tried so hard, I really tried keeping her awake with stories,  
but Carrie got quiet on me."

"Who's Carrie?" Johnny said, "Easy, lie back down.."

"S-She's right over..t.." Chris tried to point but couldn't quite remember where his seatmate was trapped. He started to sob as a frightening memory resurfaced. "I- I couldn't reach her when she stopped breathing,  
Mr. Kelly.."

"Where is she?!" Chet asked urgently.

Chris's tear filled eyes were blurred and his panic barely veiled as an odd maturity for a boy his age took over.  
"Right there.. She stopped making noises just before you got here. She's right under your arm,  
Mr. Kelly, underneath that cushion.."

Kelly heaved a heavy seat cover away from where Chris's shaky hand was pointing.

A tiny girl in pink lay twisted underneath it, but her face was blue. Gage startled. "Kelly?"

Chet crawled out of Johnny's eyesight to get close to the girl's body.  
"Got her.." Johnny heard and soon there after, sounds of rescue breathing began. Gage sighed in double sympathy when those sounds were separated with pauses for cardiopulmonary compressions.

"Keep working her, Chet.. I'll be right there." Johnny said.  
"Here.. See if she's reactive..." Johnny said and he rolled his penlight through the narrow space between them.

Chet snatched up the light and a few seconds later said.  
"Good going Chris.. She's got responsive eyes. We might be able to bring ..........her back.."

"Heh.. " the DeSoto boy smiled. "Dad taught me a few things about first aid. Like to try and keep a head bumped kid conscious... But why didn't it w-work for..Car- didn't work for..."

John noticed Chris's head beginning to sag. "Chris. Where else do you hurt besides that knee.. Chris?.."

But Chris went out and went very pale. Gage kept a grip on his partner's son's arm artery. ::Fast heart rate.  
Now what's causing this blackout?::

Johnny yanked a stubborn seat frame out of the way and found a deep cut in Chris's thigh. He pulled off his pants belt and made a tourniquet out of it, glancing at his watch for the time he began its constricting lack of blood flow. Then he made sure Chris was stable enough to be left alone.

He spoke into his walkie talkie. "Cap. We gotta move.  
We've got a little girl in witnessed cardiac arrest and a leg bleeder." Johnny amended his transmission.  
"..who's stable.. " he added for Roy's benefit.

Then he slid over near Chet to help him try to revive the girl. "You take her head. I got it here.." he said,  
taking over Kelly's one arm CPR for him.

Chet looked up in between delivering breaths. "How is he?"

"Fine. Just stressed. His leg's pinned and he's got a deep laceration on the thigh. Venous hemorrhaging only, thank g*d. Whatya find on Carrie?" Gage grunted as he worked.

"Her pupils constricted right off, both of them.  
Equally."

"Good, a little epi will..."

"Here..." came a new voice from over their heads.

Roy DeSoto was crawling over the seats with a one CC epinephren syringe in between his teeth.

"Roy! What are ya doing in here? Cap told you t-"

"Shut up junior, and let me at one of her arms." Roy said, grinning. "If this doesn't work, Cap's got the defib on eighty watts outside."

Gage kept up his CPR wordlessly. Chet didn't stop either with his ventilations.

Two seconds after Roy gave Carrie the injection,  
the girl pinked up and started coughing. Gage flipped her over onto her side, as she spat fluid and blood out of her mouth, murmuring encouragements.

Kelly stayed nearby and gratefully snatched the portable O2 another fireman handed him and began holding its mask over the restless girl's face while Gage calmed her down.

A herd of elephants couldn't keep Roy away and Johnny grinned when Roy lifted the heavy piece of roofing between him and Chris as if it were so much styrofoam. "He's fine, Roy.. Just shaky. It's just that leg. Constricting band went on two minutes five ago.."

Roy watched as Chris's eyes opened at the slightest touch of his fingers on his son's carotid pulse. "Chris?"

"Ummm?,....ugh....." then his full awareness returned.  
"Dad.. How is she?"

"How's who? Mom? She doesn't know yet."

"No, Carrie."

"Oh, the little girl you found. Thanks to your help,  
we got her back, she's even protesting getting moved a little." Roy said as Carrie made a fuss over being lifted into the scoop stokes for her evac out of the overturned school bus. "How are you doing?"

"Fair, I guess. I'm awake, aren't I?"

"Yep." Roy said. "You hang tight. " Roy said, covering his son up with a snug blanket. He set a cannula over his face and into place strictly for precautionary measures. "I got this on ya just.."

"..Just to prevent shock.. I know.." Chris said.

Roy ruffled his hair and kissed his forehead.  
"Johnny and I will be nearby until we get that seat cut away from your leg. Nothing's broken. Just.."

"..cut... I know.. I felt it earlier before I started worrying about Carrie.."

"Yeah.."

"Dad..."

"What..?"

"You can leave me now. I'm not bad off. You're suppose to help the ones worse off first."

"But.."

"Dad.. Go. I'm not a triage priority..."

"Better listen to him Roy." Johnny smiled cockeyed as he finished his sweep of the seats around them.  
"Honorary Paramedic Christopher DeSoto knows what he's talking about.."

That cracked a muddy smile onto Chris's face.

His father matched it with a smirk of his own.  
"All right. Chris, hang onto this and HT me if you need anything. I got Uncle Johnny's HT with me.."

"Deal.." Chris sighed. He set the heavy firefighter's walkie talkie by his own head and tossed his head at his father to hustle off. "I'll let the other firemen know where ya are."

Gage grinned as he helped the other rescue team move Carrie out for further treatment. He had heard every word Roy and Chris said to one another.  
::Well, looks like this scary run's got a softer side after all..:: he thought.

--------------------------------------------

Outside, the rain resurged and only a minute later the hillside gave up the ghost and fifteen tons of rain slicked slurry bore down on the bus and firemen working frantically to free the children still trapped inside of it.

Cap's voice cracked out over Chris's and Roy's HT. "Look out! Mudslide!"

--------------------------------------------

Photo : Cap helps Johnny rig an IV.

Photo : Johnny getting a stokes out of back of the squad.

Photo : .Roy at night, giving an epi shot.

Photo : Joe on the run intercom.

Photo : A kid trapped in a grill.

*********************************** From: Sam Iam Date: Fri Dec 27, 2002 9:23 pm Subject: The Mud Wrestling Angel

Johnny and Chet looked up at the dripping windows towards the roaring hill in terror. "Everybody, brace yourselves!" came Cap's shout.

The four from Station 51 and the one from station ten flung themselves into the open areas of the bus away from the gaping rend in its side. Chet barely hauled Marco behind a seat when a huge, shuddering force slammed into the bus and shoved it many meters out onto the road as mud and stone cascaded wetly in the rain from the canyon's wall.

Cap and those outside the bus were running.

"Back! Get back!" He grabbed edges of the two stokes holding Carrie and the bus driver without stopping as police and firemen alike also snatched them up with all the medical gear they could save.

Captain Stanley and the two crews of Station Ten and Station One Fourteen gasped as the rest of the hill swallowed up the school bus as if it had never been from where they ducked behind engines and heavy dredging equipment.

The mudslide stopped at the freeway divider and quieted and ironically, the rain stopped, leaving pallid warm fog behind.

Cap's HT immediately went to his mouth. "Engine 51 to Triage Ten and Squad 51. Do you read me?"

There was no reply.

He repeated his hail.

Still he received only static.

"Stoker! Tell Excavation Five to get over here! It'll take at least three bulldozers to get in there. Move!"

Cap saw Mike Stoker's helmeted form skid in the muck on the road on his side of the slide towards the construction flatbed semi trucks just pulling up in response to the landslide call which had come in earlier from L.A. headquarters.

Cap nodded in satisfaction when he saw those city men hustle faster when Stoker told them a bus with trapped kids and firemen lay beneath the pile of hillside.

He again hit his call button. "Engine 51 to Triage Ten and Squad 51. Come in......"

---------------------------------------------------

There were sounds of dripping in the blackness.  
Roy felt a small gush of warmth brush his cheek. ::That's breathing.:: "Chris?!" Roy winced when he found he couldn't move due to mud pinning him up to the waist and his head lay on something hard near Chris's chest.

His voice echoed down the hollow, still bus and into pitch inky blackness and total silence. Roy's heard the hiss of the 02 over his son's face and felt his reassuring pulse under his fingers. "Chris.. Can you hear me?"

Chris stayed quiet and didn't move. Then Roy remembered where he was, "Johnny? Chet?! Marco? "

He heard a movement and a strange fireman's voice came near. "Easy man. I'm looking for your friends. Don't move. You were out for a while and it looks like the whole d*mned hill came down on top of us. I made sure your boy was fine when I realized you were ok."

It was so dark, Roy's retinas were flashing unreal afterimages,  
making him blink. "You're from ten's..?"

"Yeah.." came the big man's chuckle. "I'm Detello, seven year engine crew lieutenant. I covered your butt when you went against your captain's orders and climbed in here. I said you were needed to stabilize the driver."

"I WAS needed to stabilize him. Marco and I barely got him out of there before the front end was buried."

"I know that. Listen, DeSoto. See if that HT is still near your boy's head. They're probably worried sick out there about us."

Roy felt as far as he could reach in the dripping ooze while the intense blackness made his eyes bug out uselessly in an attempt to see anything visually.  
"It's gone.."

"Ah, well, I'll just keep crawling around over here where I saw your buddies last..." came the calm quiet voice.. "Say,  
gimme your penlight from your pocket, Roy.."

Roy felt it and handed it out until he felt the other man's glove grope around to intercept it. "Why didn't I think of that?"  
he said, setting his head down into the mud and back onto the helmet Detello had placed there while he had been out cold.

"You're excused, DeSoto, being you're still locked in Dad's nightmare numero uno, first class. If I were in your shoes, I don't think I'd react as well as you are knowing my kid was in here. My hat's off to you.."

"I can feel that..Thanks for the pillow." he quipped.  
Roy winced as he saw a slimy form suddenly appear in a nimbus of light surrounded by shadows which lurched eerily in contrast, against equally slimy walls. Roy saw six inches of mud on the floor and it was slowly rising. He lifted Chris's unconscious head onto his shoulder.  
"Any sign of em?"

"Not yet.." came Detello's calm reply. "We could have been separated from your partner, Lopez and Kelly easily. The cave in has collapsed the "roof" here."  
Detello rapped a piece of metal on a barrier in front of him. Three taps.

Immediately, Roy heard muffled shouts and struggles.  
"H..u..r..r..y i..t.. u..p,...m....a...n. It's g..e..t..t..i..n..g s..t..u..f..f..y i..n h..e..r..e.." came Gage's voice.

"Hang on.. Let me put a shoulder into it.." Detello shouted. Roy saw his penlight go into Detello's mouth and saw it being held switched on with his tongue while the big man muscled the metal to one side. Johnny's muddy face, lacking a helmet, met nose to nose, with Detello. He, too, had a penlight in his mouth that was lit.

"Roy? You ok?" Johnny said, glancing over, and gasping.

"Yeah. Any sign of Kelly or Lopez?"

"Chet's moaning over by my feet.  
Don't know where Marco is.." Gage said.  
"Man, it's getting even deeper in here.." he exclaimed, keeping his head and chin out of the rising chilling mud.

"I know.." Detello said. "If there's any more kids in here we missed..." He didn't finish his sentence.  
"Listen, Gage, you trapped too?"

"Nah, I'm just wedged in here. I can usually get outta any nook and cranny. Just...uummgghhh..gimme a sec .." and he grunted. "On second thought. Gimme some leverage.."  
and he let Detello pull him out of the crevice he had taken refuge within.

Johnny immediately removed his overcoat in the more open space above Roy and Chris and turned right around and entered head first into the hole he had just left. "Chet! I'm free. Gimme your hands.."

"...w....h....a....t..?" came Kelly's muffled reply.

"Gimme your hands. I'm getting you outta there!  
We gotta go find Marco.. And if you see my talkie in there on your way, grab it!"

"R...o..y....o.k...? A...n..d.. h...i..s k...i..d..?"

"Yeah, they're fine. But they aren't gonna be if we dawdle. We're getting buried in mud out here.  
Come on.." Johnny said crankily.  
"These penlight batteries aren't gonna last long."

"N..o...p..r.o..b..l..e..m...G..a..g..e. I g..o..t....a.  
f..l..a..s..h..l..i..g..h..t..."

Johnny mumbled to Detello and Roy.  
"Lucky ain't he? He's got a fl.." and he grunted when Chet grasped his hand and as Detello pulled Johnny by the waist in the opposite direction for Kelly's leverage.

Kelly popped out of the slimy hole without his helmet. "Whoo, man.. the air was running out in there."

"Yeah well just try and conserve some of it.  
We're sealed off in here."

"Got that covered too. " Kelly said sitting up in a pool of mud, wiping off the flashlight on a dry spot on his pants. He switched it on to search for Marco. And then reached back into the hole and pulled out a second portable O2 he had found in the wreckage. "Thanks for bringing this in with ya,  
man.." he nodded to Station Ten's man.

"It's Detello, Kelly. Glad I could oblige."

"Your wreck bud get out ok?" Chet asked.

"Johnson? Yeah, he went out with Carrie."  
Then the big curly haired fireman met Johnny's eyes. "DeSoto's fine Gage. Just blacked out for a while. His kid's still stable.  
Bleeding's stopped so I loosened that tourniquet completely before I went looking for you."

"Smart thinking." Johnny took in a breath of oxygen off the mask from the tank Chet had retrieved. "Now, where does everybody remember Marco being when the hill fell down on top of us?"

Kelly's ears strained in the darkness around the dim circle of muddy light the meager flashlight offered from its cracked lens. ".. I think I hear something.."

Wet slurping sounds from the "roof" glopped onto the silent seats around them. The white covered children's bodies could no longer be seen.

"Chet, you're hearing things.."

"Gage just ..pipe down a minute. You probably still got mud in your ears.. Listen.. What I heard came from behind you, from where the big rip in the side of the bus was.."

All four firemen froze, studying the dripping globs of ooze raining down onto them and the hideously sagging ceiling, that was inexorably crushing down onto them by millimeters from the wet tonnage of the hillside on top of it.

The deep mud on the floor suddenly moved in a rippling liquid way and a man's foot poked out of it, heel turned up.

In horror, Roy realized the flat section he had been staring at was actually a partially submersed fireman's back.  
"Marco!! He's on his stomach over there. Get to him.  
Get to him!" he shouted. "Looks like he's pinned under the mud!"

Gage and Detello and Chet splashed through the icy mud on their hands and knees and they both felt up Lopez's body to his head. Detello grabbed the mask from the spare O2 Chet had found and pushed it into the muck until he had it around Marco's face and then he pressed it hard around Lopez's struggling nose and mouth.

Detello firmly held the back of Marco's head too, to get around the man's unthinking panic while he willed Marco to just blow out the mud in the mask for some much needed breathing room.

Gage and Chet found the heavy section of "roof" pinning Marco's head and shoulders under the now foot deep layer of muck in the bus. It was another bus seat.  
"Did ya get it to him? Is he getting air?"  
Johnny asked Detello, as he and Chet fought to raise the metal off of Lopez. The thing wouldn't move.

"Yeah, I think so.. I can feel him grabbing onto my arm.."  
Detello grunted. "We gotta hurry. This mask won't hold off the mud for long.. Water from the rain might still get in.  
And he'll drown." Marco's head was still completely buried in mud and this, Detello tried to claw away, while he shouted. "Easy man. Relax.. I got ya.. Marco.  
I got ya."

Suddenly, Marco stopped kicking underneath their hands and his limbs settled back down into the slime. But Detello still felt his back move with the small breaths the man was buying from the hastily placed O2 mask.  
He saw Johnny's shocked look when Lopez went limp.  
"He's ok. He's ok.." Detello said. "He IS breathing. I can still feel him doing it. Just hurry and get that thing off of him."

Chet and Gage rushed to get a piece of seat frame to use as a lever bar.

In a minute, the heavy debris was off. Gage and Chet grabbed Marco by the hair and hauled his lolling head up into the air. They lifted and supported him into a sitting position against Gage's chest for lack of better room.

Kelly wiped away the mud from Marco's nose and mouth.  
Lopez was barely recognizable.  
"Hey. Lopez.. You with us man..? Come on.. say something."

Lopez stayed silent, limp as a rag doll soaked in chocolate sauce.

"Oh man. He's really out.." Kelly groaned.

"His mouth clear?" Johnny asked.

Detello hastily looked with the flashlight. "Yeah.. He doing anything?"

Gage shook his head when he didn't feel Marco's stomach move at all in his bearhug.

"D*mn! Wish this mask were a ventilator."  
Detello said hastily wiping the muck out of the flimsy but cracked oxygen mask in his hands with his shirt tail.

"Yeah? Well what ya had probably saved his life Detello. That was fast thinking.." Roy said from where he lay propped on an elbow. He had Chris's head on his arm and a hand on the boy's neck pulse.

Kelly started to grasp Marco's nose and chin for a mouth to mouth seal, when Johnny said."Hang on a minute. Hang on a minute, Chet. Just hold off, we still got a minute or two to assess him. He just may be partially obstructed with mud here. He's not even cyanotic yet. Just let me check his airway first. Don't want you to aspirate anything into his lungs in your eagerness to right things." And he firmly gave Marco a couple of abdominal thrusts in a modified heimlich maneuver.

Brown muck flooded out of Marco's mouth after the fourth one and the nearly suffocated man began to bubble actively and right afterwards, his arms and legs stirred in new half consciousness.

"Tip him over tip him over!" Kelly said, hanging onto Marco's head as he vomitted frothy sand and water out his nose and mouth. They placed him prone over an upturned seat to drain out his breathing passages and soon, Detello returned the tattered but flowing oxygen mask to the violently coughing man when he started inhaling in air more than he was spitting up water. He held it in place, until Lopez had the presence of mind to manage holding it himself.

"That's it.. Welcome back to the land of the living..Marco."  
Gage said. "Just keep sucking on that O2 a bit."

It was a full two minutes before Lopez sat up on his own.  
Lopez gasped. "Oh, man. Thought I was drowning. Then I felt someone push an O2 mask over my face. I ate a lot of mud but at least, I found something to breathe.  
Think my nose is broke though." Marco said, gingerly feeling where his nostrils were bleeding around the muddy trails under them. "Somebody had my face in a vice grip."

"Sorry. That was me.." Detello said sheepishly. "The seat wasn't playing fair in your mud wrestling match. That mask was a home play advantage I couldn't resist.  
Had to do something drastic to even the odds." he said, getting to his feet to search for a crevasse leading to the outside or even for one of their lost walkie talkies. "Yeah? Well keep doing it. Maybe we'll all get out of here in one piece. *cough*." Marco rubbed the grit out of his eyes even as Johnny got a pulse off his other wrist. "I'm fine Gage. Leave me alone. Everyone else ok? *choke* Oh no, I see Chris's out."

"I think he's sleeping." Roy said. "Though I'd feel better if he had an IV or two running into him."

"Oh, you mean you're looking for this?" Detello said,  
wandering back to the others with a very familiar mud coated rectangular shape. Through the slime, they could just make out the yellow letters "I V" on the still intact gear box.

"Detello.." Roy said plainatively. "You're simply a miracle worker, you know that?"

"Yeah.. I know." He said a touch embarrassed. "Had to chew phone books to get my cap to accept me taking my promotion to engineer last year.  
Had to move on,.. cause the guys on the squad shifts were beginning to call me Angel.. Picture a guy my size with a radio nick like that.." he complained. "I'd get all the missing man details then for sure if word of that spread around and I'd use up all my great karma bailing them all outta their rough spots."

"Yeah?, well, you definitely still got that halo in my book."  
Lopez muttered, rolling his eyes. Gage firmly shoved the shattered O2 mask back onto Lopez's face.

"Make it in thought only man. In thought only. If I hear anyone here calling me Angel behind my back, I'm putting your man Lopez here right back into that man versus seat wrestling match, is that clear?"  
There was no trace of humor in Detello's voice as he glared at Chet, Johnny, and Roy.

"As crystal man.." Chet swallowed nervously.  
"You know, " and he cleared his throat like a pinned frog. "You should seriously consider going for a captain's post next, you sure got that glare down.."

"I've been practicing.." Detello muttered noisily slamming seats aside in the areas of the bus not holding dead children and carefully piling others in the areas he remembered being occupied.  
"I'm going for that test next year I'll have you know."

"Captain Angel.. Got a nice ring to it.."Kelly whispered.

"Chet.." Marco complained. "Exnay on the Oopitsday.."  
he said from the corner of his mouth as Johnny checked out his bleeding nose with a penlight.

Gage grinned but kept out of the banter. He knew his buddies were acting what every FD man called "nuts in a handbasket", to forget the horror in the scene around them. Gage fully knew how fleeting such a false comfort could be. But he was no one to deny them the attempt.

"Ohhhh. Marco.. You worry too much.  
He can't hear me, He's over there.." Chet grinned toothily confident.

Detello said silky smooth from the darkness.  
"I sure can Kelly. Better listen to mud wrestler Lopez over there."

Both the men from 51 moused down.

Detello went on, angling his head.  
"And I can hear those bulldozers buzzing around outside. Looks like both our caps are shedding bricks over us being incommunicado."  
And he placed hands like Atlas on the ceiling and gave it a shove. Chet almost swore he saw the ceiling rise a few centimeters. His mouth flopped open. "He's moving mountains man.. " he jabbed Marco's ribs with a slimy elbow. Lopez grimaced when that elbow caught him on a bruise from Gage's earlier heimlich thrusts.

Detello pegged Chet with another stare, this time one of brainstorming regard. "Say, you're not hurt, Kelly. Why don't ya haul off that lazy rear of yours and help me birdeye one of the HT's. DeSoto won't be able to start his boy's IVs without permission from Rampart and I know I'm starting to crave my four o'clock cappucino something fierce right about now."

"You got it big guy.."

"Detello will do.."

-----------------------

Photo : A school bus split wide open, shattered,  
on a road.

Photo : A mudsliding hilltop.

Photo : Detello from Ten's talking with Brackett in an ambulance.

*  
From : "Cory Anda" Subject : And Into the Daylight... Date :Sat, 11 Jan 2003 09:58:13 +0000 Chet quieted down and he patted Marco on the shoulder as he crawled by Lopez as the shivering man slowly gained his equilibrium back.

Gage half glanced at him in the dimness of the flashlight Kelly had handed him. "Marco... You need to be checked out? That seat hurt you anywhere?"

"I'm fine, Johnny. Worry about Chris ok? Not much you can do for me anyway without the gear." and Marco coughed.

"Yeah?" Gage replied with a wry weary look. "Well find something to wrap up in, you're getting hypothermic.  
And keep that O2 mask on while we look for the talkies."

Marco nodded, leaning back on a pile of metal supports behind them both and closed his eyes. He didn't even feel Detello cover him with an overcoat.

Johnny watched Marco drift with one eye, but the other was on Roy and Chris. "How's he doing?" he asked his partner.

"Chris's out. Vitals are good though." Roy coughed,  
raising out of the mud and leaning on his elbows, being careful not to disturb his son's position on his chest much. "Don't think it's much more than stress taking hold. But I'll feel a lot better when we both get our legs untangled from this debris here."

DeSoto felt the cold mud crawling higher alongside his body where he lay and he was glad his own body heat was keeping Chris somewhat warm.

Kelly bent immediately to recheck where their legs were trapped. "Doesn't look too bad. Nothing the K-12 can't handle."

Detello stood after taking a quick pulse quality check on the sleeping Marco. "That's IF.. we ever get one.."

"Pessimism from the "Angel" himself?" Kelly chuckled to raise everyone's spirits.

"More like a reality check..." and Detello once again tried his giant strength on the sagging "ceiling" of the buried school bus. This time, the metal above his head actually gave way under his shoulder lift.  
"I take that back. Those boys with the excavation crew work fast. Most of the hill is already off of us.."

Kelly got to his feet and began to shout and pound on the ceiling and yelling. "Hey!! We're in here. Six meters from the back hatch! Hey!!"

In Roy's arms, Chris flinched and startled awake with a sharp moan.. "Dad??!"

"It's ok, Chris. You're fine. We're just raising a ruckus so the others outside know where to slice into to get us out.. How do you feel?"  
DeSoto asked.

Chris blinked a few times and winced when he tried to test his legs. "My knee feels real big.  
Tight. And I'm a little sick to my stomach."

Kelly rolled his eyes ruefully so the boy could see him in the flashlight. "Aren't we all? Must've eaten a pound of mud crawling around in here."

"I ate two pounds.." Marco croaked from where he sat propped up in the darkness.

Chris laughed and winced when his father's laugh jostled his jammed knee. Then the sodden boy said. "Hey.. Before the mud slid on top of us,  
I only remember my left leg being held. Why does my right knee feel heavy?"

Kelly aimed the flashlight under the seat beyond Chris muddy jeans and a few seconds later, dragged out the handy talkie. "Will miracles never cease. Detello, you keep right on complaining ,...cause it makes whoever you got looking after ya work that much harder."

"I don't like to press my luck." the big man grumbled. "Especially with that.."

Gage and Roy both made a grab for the talkie after Chet got most of the mud off of its controls but Detello was faster than both of them.

He snatched the HT to his mouth. "Engine 51 this is Triage Ten, over.."

The HT came alive in excited voice.  
##That you Detello? Hang on, we're calling a cutting crew in right now. Cover your victims against the sparks#  
Captain Stanley said. ##We start dismantling in two minutes.##

"10-4." Detello grinned. "Standing by. We're all a bit slimy, but ok. Marco took in some mud but he's stable with only minor complications.  
And get a doctor on the phone. We've just one survivor in need of an IV authorization.."

##Understood. I'll have Stoker raise Rampart.  
Engine 51, out.##

-------------------------------------

Outside the crushed bus, Cap didn't even wait for the bulldozer to leave the area before he waved his men in with the extrication equipment.  
"Ok, Move it in there.. Easy. That top chassis's bound to be weak from the mudslide, so go slow. Cut three quarters around only, we'll peel it back and get them out through the roof.  
I'm afraid opening the emergency hatch now will only collapse the rest of the bus on top of them."

The men working at Cap's side nodded.

Cap shouted. "Ok.. cutting now..!!" he shouted.

-------------------------------------------

Inside, all five firemen and Roy's son winced when the bright fountain of tangerine sparks from a roaring K-12 bit through the steel shell of the bus above them. They winced when real sunlight sent shafts of brilliant daylight into their eyes.

"Oh, man.. Now I know how miners feel when they've been in a cave in and we dig them out."  
Kelly complained.

Roy covered Chris's face and his own with his own helmet as the firemen outside cut a hole into the bus. "It's a sight better than watching that flashlight die out, don't you think?"

Detello flicked the coat over Marco's face and mask and hunched down himself after coating his own shoulders with wet mud to keep his shirt from catching fire. "A whole LOT better." he admonished Kelly.  
His voice was a little strained from his eagerness to win freedom for his companions. He began fussing with the cutaway section even before the man above was finished excising the flap. He had it accordianed out of the way in seconds. "All right, give me the K-12 on the double. I've a trapped medic and boy down here.."

Cap peered into the hole from where he knelt on top of the bus. "They hurt bad?"

Roy squinted in the bright swath of sunlight that shafted down onto his face. He peeked around a protective arm as he spoke before Detello did. "Nah, Cap." Roy said from where he lay in the ooze. "We're just leg pinned. Got that authorization from Rampart yet?"

Stoker said. "Here.. Morton wants to talk to you.." and he lowered the phone receiver dangling on its cord down to Roy so the biophone antennae would stay in the open air so it wouldn't lose telemetry with the doctor's base station.

Morton was succinct and to the point.  
"DeSoto. Start a large bore normal saline,  
500 CC's and run wide open. Give me a vitals set when you can on the child. How's Marco? Stoker couldn't tell me much."

Roy glanced over at Marco and Gage, who was hovering over him, and said. "He was submersed underneath the mud for about two minutes. He was out until we got some of the sludge out of his throat and got him on simple masked 02. He's only a little groggy."

"And chilled. His shivering's stopped."  
Gage added.

"And mildly hypothermic Rampart.." Roy told Mike.

"10-4, 51. Continue both victims on 02 and immobilize the child as a precaution when you get him out of there. That bleeder may indicate fractures we don't know about in that effected leg." Morton told Roy.

"Understood. Large bore NS, wide. O2 and treat for shock. Long board immobilization for Chris.."

Morton at the base station, frowned. "51, Could you repeat that? Did you say a victim's name at that last part?"

Gage took the phone from Roy when DeSoto tried to reach for the IV box.  
Kelly took the kit quickly out of his hands too.

Chet admonished him. "Now Roy, you know Johnny's gotta be the one to directly treat your son. Fire department policy. Just lie back and don't move while Detello makes that last slice by your leg with the saw...."

Gage said. "Uh,10-4, Rampart. He did.  
Chris, the boy, is Roy's son..."

------------------------------------------

Nurse McCall, having just walked into the glass cubicle, gasped at that last admission.  
"What?!" Dixie exclaimed, She gripped Dr. Morton's shoulder.

Morton shushed her with a motion as he listened to what Gage confirmed. He covered the receiver with a palm and sighed. "Oh, boy. How the h*ll did DeSoto get inside that bus anyway. I thought firefighters weren't allowed to treat family members as a standard working policy.."

"They're not.." Dixie said. "Maybe their circumstances left them no choice in the matter.." Her curiosity got the better of herself and she asked. "What are his vitals signs? His trauma bad?"

Morton answered. "Don't know. They're still extricating both him, Roy and Marco, a fellow engine crew man, who almost drown. It's a school bus in a mudslide.."

Dixie winced in sympathy and bit her lip.  
"Roy must be frantic with worry being with him like that."

"Gage won't let him get into any medical hot water and something tells me that their captain won't let him do that either.." Morton said.  
He lifted his hand off the receiver in a quick motion. "Contact me in route of any consciousness level changes and I want a set of vitals on Marco and Chris the moment they're en route.."

"10-4, doc.." Gage said and he waved to Stoker to hand over hand the phone cord back up again out of sight through the hole. "Thanks Stoker.  
Hand down the first stokes. We'll get Marco outta here first.."

"I don't need a stretcher, Gage, I can--"

"...Relax and enjoy the ride, Lopez. And that's an order." Cap interrupted. "You're a victim until Rampart clears you, is that understood?"

"Perfectly.." Lopez sighed, then he coughed when some lingering mud from his sinuses tried to trickle back into his throat. He lifted his mask off only long enough to spit the grit aside and out of his mouth.

It wasn't long before Gage and Detello had Lopez bundled up in yellow plastic insulating sheets and had him ready to be hoisted out of the bus.  
Marco's face showed his uneagerness to be stretchered out, but he cooperated. He snuck in a move dettaching his own 02 tubing so Chris wouldn't lose his 02 bottle.

Gage did a double take at that, frowning, but he saw Stoker immediately compensate for his respiratory care once they had Marco level with the portable 02 from the engine. Lopez did him one better by strapping the mask to his own face so Mike was freed up to help get Roy and his son out.

Cap had the rest of Station Ten carry Marco out of the deep, treacherous mud slide to a wheeled ambulance gurney already waiting for him on the firm highway beyond. He crouched by Marco's side as the Mayfair attendants covered him up snugly in the beige blankets. "'Don't need a lift out', he says."  
Cap muttered. "You're colder than an ice cube there pal."

Marco didn't deign to reply as the head of the stretcher was raised to make him more comfortable. "It's just from the wet, Cap. I'm not injured."

"Hmmph.. I'll believe that once Gage gets a look at ya to be sure. Hang tight." And he ruffled Marco's caked hair with a glove.

Captain Stanley returned to the bus just as Roy's boy was lifted out, complete with the IV Gage had begun. He could see a red sodden stain through the sheeting on the boy's left thigh and he saw Detello start to take the boy's shoe off to check for a foot pulse.

"Ok. I've got a good one here. He's ok to move."  
Detello said.

He watched the boy get lowered onto the next gurney wheeled over to them before he reached down to grab and haul both Kelly and Gage out of the bus with both hands at the same time.  
Cap's eyebrows lifted in amazement at that.  
"What a Sampson type." he said softly.

Chet hopped down, eyes tearing from the bright sun.  
"He was Atlas earlier Cap. Kept the roof from caving in on us until you guys manage to shovel the worst of the muck off the bus.." He padded off with his shoes slurping liquidly but he turned, adding. "But really he's a real bonfide Angel.."

It was Cap's turn to frown in confusion.  
Then he shouted after his departing mud covered man. "Were you guys short on air in there or something?"

But Chet was already out of earshot as he asked Stoker to hose down his shoes and outer wear "really good".

When they were out, Detello subtly shook his head to the other firemen surrounding him, that there were no other children still alive inside.

Gage took full advantage of Roy still waiting to be cut free to take a closer look at Chris. He kept expression off his face when he saw the extent of the laceration on the boy's thigh. He knew at least, that it would require plastic surgery to fully mend it after the deep gash was thoroughly cleaned of mud and sand and allowed to drain open for a few days.

But he smiled when the boy's BP was only slightly below normal. "There.. That's not too bad." he grinned down at the boy,  
adjusting the cannula's prongs into the right place inside his nose. "Strong as all get out.  
You're not even moderately shocky."

"Dad made me rest a bit while we were in there. I think I slept once." Chris admitted.

"He sure did..." Roy said, jumping down from the bus with the ground crew firemen's help.  
One of them tossed DeSoto the IV box afterwards. " For about half an hour there."

Roy fussed with Chris's blankets until Johnny slapped his hands away. "I got him, I got him,  
Why don't you go check on Marco in the rig?  
We'll meet you in there as soon as I relay his vitals to Morton."

DeSoto reluctantly retreated.

--------------------------------

Cap gave Gage a subtle thumbs up for finding an excuse to separate Roy from Chris. But a further significant glint in Cap's eye made Johnny say, "He's fine Cap.  
Nothing major's been damaged here."

"That's means good news, son.." Cap said, patting Chris on the shoulder.

"I know. I could tell because my leg didn't squirt out at all when I first did it, trying to reach Carrie.."

At the name, and another exchange of looks from Stoker, Cap learned the little girl hadn't survived the trip to the hospital despite her successful revival, so he had plenty of warning time before Chris's next question.

"How's Carrie?"the blond boy asked.

Johnny said. "Let's concentrate on getting you squared away first, ok? Does your head hurt at all? No?.... Just that knee.. ok.. now Cap and I are going to immobilize that leg in a splint just to keep it from jostling around.. ok?"

Chris nodded.

Once that was done, Chris, Johnny, the engine's 02 tank and the gear were all loaded up in the rig waiting with Marco and Roy.

Detello, following behind them, glanced up and saw the five children that managed to get out of the wreck unscathed. They looked older than their years. One, almost looked like DeSoto's son from where he stood, numb and confused in a muddy pool by the side of the road.

Detello gave him a small smile he hoped would be reassuring and offered the glassy eyed youngster a salute off his crusty helmet's rim. His smile faded when the boy didn't grin back. ::So many have died today. How is this going to effect us?:: he thought. ::I was a medic for three years and I've never seen a run as bad as this. Please.. g*d. Make us forget the details of this one, fast...::

-----------------------------------------------

It took twelve minutes to get to the hospital.

Then.......

-----------------------------------

Photo : A rumpled bus, cut open.

Photo : Roy, mud covered, on the biophone.

Photo : A boy, lying in a mud pool, in the sun.

Photo : Johnny and others carrying a stokes and gear.

*animated gif* : Ambulance with flashing lights at night.

Photo : A close up of Cap, looking down, wearing his helmet.

*  
From : "patti keiper" Subject :[EmergencyTheaterLive] The Breaking Point.. Date : Sun, 12 Jan 2003 08:29:28 +0000 Dr. Morton opened the ambulance doors to receive the two gurneys from Roy and Johnny. "We'll take the boy into Treatment One, Gage.  
DeSoto, how's Lopez?"

"Fine, doc. Once we got those wet clothes off he started to warm up. He's fully time and place oriented; never lost it and there's still no signs of pulmonary edema." Roy reported.

"Good. Dixie has Treatment Two set up for him with Dr. Early. Stay with him."

"But-"

" DeSoto. Carry out my orders." he snapped. Then he said more gently. "I won't keep you in the dark about Chris, Roy. Know that as a promise. But you know the regulations.. "

Roy grumbled, reciting.."No treatment contact is allowed at all in a hospital setting for anyone who's kin of a victim. I know that doc." he said as they rapidly wheeled their two patients inside Rampart through the emergency doors.

Morton angled his dark head."We'll let you see him once we've determined he's truly stable and only after he's been fully treated."

"Doc.. I don't want to leave him.."

Chet opened the door of the squad he had driven in and jumped out of the seat. The plastic sheet he had used to keep mud off its upholstery had dried to his back and legs and he hastily peeled it off, leaving it on the hood. He hurried past where Morton and Roy where debating. "Roy,  
just hush and let the man do his job. I'll be your eyes in there FOR you man."

Morton looked up from his quick exam of Chris's eyes as they walked inside the hospital.  
"Why are you planning on following us, Kelly? There's nothing wrong with you..."  
Morton challenged.

"Oh, gee. Didn't Gage tell you? He and I were sandwiched in debris pretty good when the hill came down on us. I might keel over any second, doc." he said factitiously.

For once, Johnny backed him up by keeping a straight face to support his fast talking job on Morton.

"Is that a fact......" Mike sighed in resignation, knowing he couldn't stop anyone ELSE who wanted in on current news about a coworker's family member's medical status. He surprised himself by not retorting further at Chet as he, Gage, Chris and an ambulance attendant, got the longboarded boy transferred to the large room's exam table.

Kelly shouted before the door closed on Roy's face. "I'll be right out and I'll meet you in Marco's room with an update, DeSoto!"

"I'l..l.. h..o..l..d.. y..o..u.. t..o.. t..h..a..t, C..h..e..t."  
came Roy's muffled retort through the door.

Kelly gingerly held up defensive hands in appeasement and backed away self consciously from Roy's angry voice to carry out his promise to him. He strode to the foot of Chris's bed and quietly watched his medical care take place.

"Chris.. the man who's poking and prodding you is Dr. Morton. He'll take really good care of you.." Johnny introduced quickly.

"Hi, Dr. Morton.."

"Hello..." Mike answered. "The nurse to my right is Carol Evans."

"Hi Ms. Evans."

"Hi Chris.." she answered. "Warm enough?"

"Uh huh.."

Carol Evans smoothly moved Chris's IV to a pole and switched around his O2 supply to a wall port while Gage helped Morton expose Chris's leg laceration.

"He still tachycardic?" Morton asked.

Gage was about to reply when a voice piped up from tiny form bundled inside the longboard.  
"Yeah..." Chris said firmly. "I'm 140."

Johnny grinned at Morton's surprised look and the dark skinned doctor said. "You won't mind if I confirm your findings on an EKG, son?"

"It's what dad would do..." Chris agreed.

"Is that so.." Morton said, casting amused eyes at everyone in the room. "Well you're absolutely right young fella. That IS the next thing we'll do." Morton smiled. "You're a very smart young boy.. How'd you come to learn so much?"

"Classes. I hang out when dad recertifys or when he's gotta teach the new FD trainees to become paramedics."

"You do?" Chet asked surprised.

"Uh huh.." Chris told him. "It's fun.. Sometimes they use me to practice their dressings and neck/back immobilizing. Last month, I was a play victim in a fake airjet crash at LAX."

Chet Kelly was very thoughtful when he heard what Chris had accomplished and what he had learned.

"So, you wanna be a medic when you grow up?" Morton asked, palpating Chris's abdomen for tenderness.

"Nah,.. I wanna be an architect like my grandpa. I'll just keep what I learn now handy for when I have my own kids. You know how much trouble we can get into at my age." Chris said wisely.

Johnny practically burst with mirth and pride at that little gem coming from his partner's first born.

Chris's worldly personality had finally charmed Dr. Morton. "Son, I can't believe you'd EVER get that way." Morton said, leaning close to his head with a confidential smiling whisper.

Chris motioned with a crooking finger, and when the young doc had come closer, he whispered into Morton's ear.  
"I sometimes do. But it's my sister who always starts it."

Morton patted Chris on the shoulder. " Yeah?  
Well she's not here right now to work her mischief,  
so you can let your guard down. We're going to get some xrays of your leg to confirm non fracture injury to that thigh and knee and if I like your pictures,  
we'll see about getting you free of those straps and that C-collar."

"Fair enough. I'm tired of being strapped up like a mummy. What after that?"

Oh,.. let me see.." Morton sighed, tapping a finger on his lips. "Most likely, since you're doing so well,  
it's up to surgery for a repair job. How does that sound?"

"Like I'm not going to enjoy it too much. Don't think I wanna go."

"Ice cream after.." Chet promised.

"Ok, ok, ok.. I'll go. But make sure the gas man doesn't give me the stuff that makes me sick afterwards." Chris said, watching his Uncle Gage tape EKG patches onto his chest gravely.  
"I watched my sister puke for an hour after she had her tonsils out.."

"I'll work out a deal with him.." Morton said,  
with a wink and nod. Then he turned on the EKG and studied Chris's rapid heartbeat on the live screen.  
For a cross reference, he got a paper strip reading, too. "Hmmm. " he said after a minute or so.  
"Just simple V tach here, Gage." he mumbled.

"That's what we figured, even just listening apically." Johnny admitted.  
Then more loudly, Morton looked up.  
"Guess what Chris? Your EKG's telling me .  
that you're just ...thirsty..." he concluded to his small patient, setting hands on his hips.

"Thirsty?" and a serious puzzlement filled the young boy's face. "I don't think I am.." Chris said with amazement. "I haven't been playing any softball today."

"You're forgetting that leg cut of yours. You must have bled some while you were still buried in the mud. Most likely, with all the excitement going on, you weren't even aware of it."

"Oh. I WAS scared a lot, doctor. But Detello,  
Uncle Johnny, Mr. Kelly, Mr. Lopez and dad,  
found me and then I wasn't afraid any more after that."

"Good.." Mike soothed. "You're doing fine here, too. You're very calm."

Chris DeSoto's face fell into a serious expression. "So, Dr. Morton...."

"Umm hmmmm." Mike replied, looking into the boy's ears for liquids other than mud with an otoscope.

"You say I lost some fluid vul...vel...."

"Volume.." Morton completed. "A bit.  
About as much as three soda cans, I suspect."  
Mike straightened up on his exam stool and wheeled it around so he could recheck a pedal beat in Chris's effected leg and to test range of motion in the swollen knee.

"And that's why my heart's working harder right now?" the child said, carefully thinking.

"Yep." Johnny said. "You nailed it, Chris."

The tiny boy's muddy face furrowed as he thought about his situation."Then shouldn't those drops be going faster?" Chris said pointing at his IV hanging near his head.

Kelly and Gage laughed when Morton sputtered as he told Nurse Evans to increase the flow into the drip chamber. They immediately piped down when Mike glared at them in offense.

Chris was oblivious to the innocent commotion he caused, suddenly very interested in the great Xray machine wheeling into his exam room.

----------------------------------------------------

Marco Lopez was raised semi sitting on his gurney beneath a pile of heated blankets. The torn, ripped field oxygen mask had been replaced with an in house cannula on low flow. Doctor Early was carefully listening to Lopez's breath sounds through the front side of his chest. "Take a deep breath. .  
And another one.... Good.." the doctor encouraged.

Then he thoughtfully pulled off his stethoscope.  
"I'm not hearing anything abnormal here, Marco. How do you feel?"

"Fine.." the fireman replied.  
Dr. Early began examining his ribs and abdomen,  
and Lopez flinched and caught his breath,  
when Joe found a band of tenderness around his diaphram. "Except there. Just a little sore."

"Roy, I thought you said he was uninjured." Joe remarked looking up at DeSoto standing near Lopez's head.

"He isn't injured. I think he's just a little tender because Johnny had to clear his throat a bit when we first got him free."  
Roy said timidly, crossing his arms over his elbows, nervously.

"Heimlich?"

"Yeah..."

Joe felt all over other areas of Marco's abdomen but found nothing else wrong. "Most likely, this is just the typical bruising from that kind of maneuver.  
Marco, does it hurt when I do this?" Dr. Early asked as he prodded and pressed on his liver and spleen.

"Not much.. Hardly at all."

"Hmph.." and he put his stethoscope back into his ears.

Roy and Chet and Marco all waited in silence.

Joe sat back on his seat after listening to Marco's bowel sounds. "Everything sounds normal. So, that's probably what it is. Roy, was his orthostatic BP, when you checked it last, wide spread?"

"Not appreciably. It didn't sink into the basement if that's what you're looking for.. Hardly moved ten millibars, systolically or diastolically."

Joe's face lost his doctoring look and melted into a casual bent. "Now I'm convinced. "  
And he sighed in relief.. "You're a lucky man Lopez.  
Mud inhalation has a tendency to cause a nasty case of pneumonia. And both your lungs are completely clear. But, I'd like to ask you just a few questions to put my own mind at ease."

"Ok, doc." Marco nodded.

"Do you remember if you blacked out at all?"

"I didn't. Not at all. Just got a little tired when I got cold."

Roy's agreeing nod confirmed it for Joe.

Joe stood up. "Your vital signs are normal. Your temperature is now where it should be, and you have absolutely no indications of internal injury."  
he took his stethoscope off from around his neck and stuffed it into a copious pocket. "I'm releasing you."

"You mean, he's going to be fine?" DeSoto asked.

"Healthiest near drowning I've ever seen."  
Joe chuckled. "But I am prescribing you some antibiotics just as a precaution. There's no telling whether or not that mud you ingested was contaminated with sewage runoff or other substances from the slide."  
"Oohhwwk." Marco made a face.

Joe went on, with a kind smile. "But I wouldn't worry about that.  
Your body will excrete it naturally and maybe the only thing you'll notice is that you may get slightly constipated later on."

"Wonderful.." Lopez said sarcastically.

"I can prescribe a laxative if you're worried." Joe added helpfully.

"Don't bother. My mother's probably got a recipe somewhere that'll do the trick if things get into a bind."

Roy hid a smile. "I think your mother's corn tamales might be just the thing."

Marco looked aghast, "Are you saying my mama's cooking..... " Lopez hunted around for delicate terms. "....puts..you off Roy?"

"Honestly? At times..it does." Roy admitted,  
refolding his arms subconsciously.

Lopez slumped back onto his pillow.  
"Oh brother..She's not going like hearing about that.."

"Look. Lopez.. I- I- It's no big deal. Really. Listen.  
Tell her it's just our intolerance for spicy food." Roy said matter of fact. "That it runs only in my family.." he added drolly.

"It does?"

"Yeah.." Roy said empathically and he uncrossed his arms to present an image of conviction.

"Oh.. Thanks for uh,.. letting me know about that ..uh .. effect. Wouldn't want mom to worry that her food bothered anyone."

"Tell her it truly doesn't. " Roy said. " Tell her we DeSotos are atypical gastronomically speaking. And that her reputation as Prima Dona Cocina Senora is unthreatened. Have no fear."

Marco studied Roy's face for long moments,  
weighing his words. Finally, he slowly nodded.  
His hurt feelings tamed.

"That settles it then. Marco's mom cooks Marco some of her famous corn tamales.. and... I give you this.."Joe rose with Marco's chart and ripped out the form from it for Lopez with his written prescription. "A broad spectrum antibiotic."

Lopez nodded in tired compliance, grudgingly.

Roy turned off Marco's O2 feed, took it off his grumbling co worker,  
rolled up its tubing, and tossed it into a waste receptacle bin. "Chin up, Marco.  
You could be me.."

Marco glanced up in sudden alarm at Roy's out of character self jab.

Right then, the treatment room doors opened and a bustling, cheerfully whistling Chet, entered. He had body showered in the surgical locker room and was wearing a luxuriously clean uniform despite his still heavily mud flecked face. In his arms, he carried two more sets of shoes, shirts and slacks for Marco and Roy. And even two pairs of T-shirts and boxer shorts.

Roy recognized those right away.

But Marco remarked faster. "Hey,  
who raided our lockers at the station?"

"Detello did. His company was released off scene before Cap and Stoker and he took a few liberties. Conned the Batallion Chief out of his car for an hour to go get us these."

"Wow.. what a saint." Joe said, raising his eyebrows.

"You have no idea, man. Detello's definitely saint grade material. Or maybe even higher, doc."  
Chet said, rolling his eyes. "He makes Camelot's Lancelot Du Lacque seem like a two bit wuss."

"Really..?" Joe said.

"It was uncanny, Dr. Early. Just when we needed equipment or needed a hand getting out of a tight spot, this Detello guy always managed to come up with a miraculous solution. He's the one who kept Marco from drowning with a flimsy 02 mask until we could get him outta trouble." Chet elaborated.

"Yeah, only thing is he probably broke my nose.."  
Marco said.

"He broke your nose?" Joe asked. "I thought that red on your face was just mud..." and he drew out his penlight to examine the inside of Marco's nose and he soon put it away to palpate the surrounding face bones carefully. "Canyon mud from Escondido.."

Roy blinked. "Yeah, we were near Escondido, off the freeway." ::What a detective..:: he thought.

"I'm not feeling any crepitus here. Can you breathe through your nose ok?"

Marco nodded. "Yes. It's just a little tender."

"Want us to do an x-ray to be sure?"

"Would it effect anything? I mean, what will you do if it is broken?"

"Nothing. I'm seeing no deformity. "First do no harm."  
Joe recited. "Better to leave well enough alone since it isn't hurting enough to bother you much."

Roy grinned thoughtfully. "A symptom which seems like no symptom IS no symptom."

"Exactly what I was thinking. My original prognosis stands Marco. You're free to go." Joe said. "Kel's rubbing off on you Roy. That's Dr. Brackett's mantra."

Roy smiled even bigger. "From paramedic training class. I remember.." Then Roy's stress began to poke through and he found himself growing impatient to hold Kelly to his promise. "Chet..."

Chet was busy at the sink and cupboard finding a wash bowl and a stand so Marco could rinse off the worst of the mud off himself before he changed into his clothes.

"Chet.." Roy repeated.

"Hmmm?" Kelly said, after frothing up the antibiotic soap in the bowl with a few fingers. He couldn't resist bending over and rinsing his own face free of mud.

"How's Chris?"

"Chris..?" Chet said, still preoccupied with the luxury of steaming clear water so near at hand.

"My son..? H- How's he doing?"

"Your son's here?" Joe asked quickly, looking up from the chart he was recording.

"Yeah, he was in the bus with us.." Marco said.  
"Yeah, Chet. How's he doing?"

Chet grimaced and said. "Ahh! Roy couldja hand me a towel? I think I got soap in my eye.."

Roy levelled one at his face with force.  
"Chet!!"

"Oww, thanks. Uh," Kelly said using the towel's corner to twist grit out of his ear. "He's one hundred percent Ayee Okay, Roy. Just some surgery to suture him up. No lasting damage.." he said mildly to them all when he looked up.

"You're certain..."

"Does Morton ever smile?" Chet said deadpan.

Roy let down his suspicion about the validity of his news immediately and relaxed.

But Lopez was still discontented.  
"Chet.." Marco prompted.

"Huh.."

"How am I supposed to wash up with that?"

"With what?"

Roy and Lopez both pointed down.

Kelly's charitable wash bath offering was now dark red with mud and crusty sand. "Oh,, sorry.  
Here Marco, let me draw you up another one."

Joe left the treatment room, chuckling.

Roy followed him, admonishing after Marco and Chet as he left, holding the door open with a deep lean.  
"You guys got fifteen minutes to clean up. We can then all leave in the squad together. If we jam in tight, we can get four in the cab. We've done it before.."

"Wait a minute. You're going to leave Chris alone here at Rampart?" Kelly asked.

"Yes.. No.. Oh, I don't know.. Never had this happen before, don't know if Cap'll let me remain here."

"Of course he will, DeSoto. Are you outta your everloving mind?" Kelly frowned passionately.

"Yeah, just a little. The crisis is over and I guess I'm finally reacting.." Roy said numbly.

"I'll say."

But Roy acted as if he didn't hear Kelly at all as his mind was still racing.  
"I'll call Joanne, let her know what's happened to Chris, and get cleaned up myself.  
Then we can go.." he muttered, already losing recollection of Chet's firm belief Cap would release Roy from active duty because of his son's mishap.

"You're gonna do all that in fifteen minutes?  
Man, Joanne's gonna fall apart for sure.  
Nothing like the maternal instinct." Kelly commented.

"Yeah well that maternal instinct's also been down this route before. Joanne's not some snivelling panicky mother who'll faint at the slightest bad news."

"Never said she was going to faint I said she might fall apar--" Chet began.

"Kelly..." Roy said irritably.

"What..?"

"Just go help Marco change."

Chet finally saw he was outta line.  
"Right.." He peeked out further from the Treatment Room. "But then we gotta talk pal.."

"About what?" Roy snapped.

"About something your son's into, man. Think I might wanna get into it, too, real soon."  
Chet said mysteriously.

"I'm dying with suspense..Can it wait? My life's sorta kinda been turned upside down today if you haven't noticed.." DeSoto said sarcastically.

"Yeah, I noticed.. And yeah. It can wait. Better yet,  
I'll bring up my idea to Johnny. He might be in a better mood to offer an opinion. Man, at least I know GAGE can handle his stress.."

"Not this kind.." Roy fired back and he let the door swing shut between them. DeSoto felt like an immediate terd for lashing out at Kelly but a part of him really didn't care at the moment.

All he could think about was that phone call to Joanne.

All through his shower in the hospital locker room, he rehearsed how he was going to break the news to the family.

Then he figured it out. He would let Chris call home himself, before he was prepped for surgery.  
::Nothing like hearing news from the source:: DeSoto sighed. ::Maybe I'll have Dixie string in a landline from the wall, to Chris's bed so he can dial out directly from a phone that isn't the red one. Might ease the shock for Joanne and my daughter.::

An overwhelming paternal angst gripped Roy. His separation from his son following his near fatal accident suddenly felt intolerable.

Roy couldn't seem to dress fast enough for comfort's sake and all he could see was the memory of Chris's mud covered face blending in with the hillside's guts, pooling in the bus, whenever he closed his eyes.

Something very integral inside Roy, ....finally snapped.

-----------------------------------

Photo : Morton in scrubs.

Photo : Marco smiling at you through the squad's open door window.

Photo : Joe Early standing by an IV pole.

Photo : Johnny looking sweaty and tense.

Photo : Chet making a point in close up.

Photo : Roy on a payphone, looking pained.

Photo : Roy in a pool of mud, with his unconscious son.

*  
From: Katherine Bird .uk Date: Wed Jan 15, 2003 12:10 am Subject: The Shell..

-----------------------------------------------

It was morning, and the day after the school bus rescue. A-shift slowly made their way into the kitchen for coffee after changing into their work clothes.

Cap was the first one to the steaming coffee pot.  
In his hands were the run sheet forms for the bus's incident. He placed them fanned out in the middle of the table top and placed the pot in their center so anyone reaching for it would have to see the forms before getting a cup filled.

Then he retreated to his recliner and the morning newspaper folded neatly there by C shift.

He intentionally didn't read the headlines which covered the bus crash and the journalist sensationalism about how many had died in the slide, moving on instead, to the sports pages.

-------------------------------------------

Johnny Gage rubbed feigned sleepy eyes and darted through the kitchen door, jostling with Chet in a vie for the coffee pot. Both firemen grabbed its black handle and Cap said,  
"When the fur stops flying over there, eyeball the papers you're not going to spill that coffee on.. Take a set and fill them out before lunchtime."

Johnny and Chet's amicable mood evaporated when they realized it was the bus run's mortality forms. Gage sighed glumly, "Right Cap, uh, we'll get right on these.. uh, do the investigators want to know complete details?"

"As best you can, Gage. And I know recalling back to yesterday isn't going to be pleasant. Just stick to positional details and what ya found."

Chet sat on the kitchen table and took a sip of his coffee, still lost in the sobering feel in the room,  
and poured Johnny's cup full after his own.  
"What's the point of an investigation, Cap? I mean, the guy who hit the bus was DOA."

Cap looked up uncomfortably."Its a suit against the city in an action concerning the mudslide.  
Negligience on the part of the highway department for not shoring up that canyon wall to withstand flooding."

"That craziness, Cap. Most of those..kids wer-" and Johnny's voice broke as a memory of the little girl who was swept away down the storm drain filtered into his mind. Gage fought the emotion out of his voice and continued.. "...most of those poor kids were gone even before the slide happened." Gage insisted. "Besides, that rainfall was abnormally high. Most inches an hour since the 1920's the Chief said.  
There's no cause for such a class action."

"I know that." Cap said. "But these kids's parents are grieving and you know how that goes. Any outlet's a channel for them."

Roy had entered the kitchen quietly, and he refused the third coffee mug Johnny offered him.  
"No thanks. " he said, sitting on the table next to Johnny. "Are we going to have to testify about those fatalities, Cap?"

Hank shrugged diffidently in the negative, "The Chief, this morning, just asked about our run sheets so far. No hearings in sight for any of us yet. I'll,...I'll..let you know as soon as I can about that.."

"Thanks.." Roy said softly.

Marco piped up. "Hey Roy, how's your boy? Is he ok? I didn't get to hear how he was doing after I left yesterday. Dixie refused to fill me in when she wheeled me out the back door."

Roy smiled a half hearted smile. "That's probably because she figured you already had a full plate concerning your own recovery. She most likely, didn't want ya to worry about anything else, Lopez."

"Since when does asking about something like that constitute being a burden?" Marco complained.

Johnny grinned. "Dix was only looking out for your best interests. Besides, I'll bet she called ya a few hours after you got home with the good news, didn't she?"

"Yeah." Marco said. "She did.. But mama said I was sleeping.."

"Dix did her job then." he grinned. "She made sure she got the news ya wanted." he concluded.

"Not soon enough.." Marco scoffed.

Roy thought about that remark thoughtfully and mumbled to himself. "It's never soon enough.." But no one else heard him.

Stoker pulled out a chair for Roy. "So,.."  
he said grandly.. "..don't keep us in suspense. Tell us how he is.."

The squeal of the chair's legs on the tile floor broke Roy out of his reverie and he blinked a few times. But his face stayed flat and almost emotionless.  
"Chris's gonna be fine. He came outta surgery with flying colors. His leg's gonna heal cleanly,  
and he's handling his best friend Carrie's death as well as can be expected..." he paused when the gang grew reflective for his benefit. "Joanne and I are just glad it's all over with.." Roy said, trying to grin, without confidence.  
"Chris goes home Friday once the drainage shunts are removed."

Cap noticed Roy's lack luster mannerisms.  
"You ok there, Roy?" he said, setting his paper down.

"Yeah, Cap.. I- I'm fine.. Just tired I guess."  
DeSoto replied.

Captain Stanley's gaze bore right into Roy's until Roy thought he was going to start fidgetting under their scrutiny. But finally, Hank sighed.  
"Ok, you know the support panel's there if you want to go talk to anyone sooner. I've got us all scheduled with the counselors for disaster debriefing this afternoon. The usual routine."

The rest of the gang cleared their throats and mumured uncomfortably. They all knew they needed to talk about the run as soon as they could, before its impact could effect any of them even more.

"Ok, Cap.." Then Roy noticed the last remaining Code F report form resting on the table. "Oh. I forgot.  
I'll get right on this.." he promised.

"Take your time.. These aren't due at Headquarters until six.." Hank said.

The kitchen fell into quiet as each of the gang filled out the grim details of facts and the actions they each had taken during the bus accident.

The tension was so thick, Henry started to whine at their concentrated silence.

Marco and Chet got up immediately and took their forms and donuts to the couch. Lopez took Henry into his lap and fed him a treat. Stoker faked stretched, without comment, studying his shoes.

"Can't hide anything from Henry, can we?"  
Johnny said to no one in particular.

"Nope. He's a hot dog who's a blood hound. What can we hide from a nose that big?"

And everyone laughed. Everyone except Roy.

"Say, Gage.."  
Kelly smacked Gage on the shoulder to get his attention from where he was carefully writing on his incident form.

"Oww, Kelly now cut that out. Now I'm going to have to start filling this out all over again."  
Johnny groused. Then he rubbed his arm.  
"That's a sore spot from yesterday."

"Sorry Gage. But listen.. I almost brought this up to DeSoto but he was too busy being a fidgetty father yesterday to pay me any attention."

"Gee. I wonder why? Kelly, just get to the point." Johnny said impatiently.

"Yeah, Chet. Get to the meat of it already." Marco said from his kitchen seat.

Kelly glanced up and suddenly noticed that everyone,  
including Cap, was paying close attention to him. He immediately got embarrassed.  
"Now, listen fellas. I just wanted to bring up a conversation with Johnny that was kinda private here, you know what I mean?"

Cap's eyebrows rose. "Fraid we don't. In it for an inch, in it for a mile, we figure. Right gang?  
Anything you need to say about work, we're entitled to know about, because we're just one big, close knit, happy outfit here, Kelly."

Gage and the others all agreed with animated nods and gestures.

"Speak for yourself, Cap! uh, I mean sir.."  
Kelly amended. He whined. "Oh, come on guys.  
For me..?" He sighed when no one looked away. "Ok, ok. I see I have no choice in the matter while I get an answer for myself. I see. Ok,.. all right. I'll just come right out and say it then.. Johnny, do you think I got the right stuff to make the coursework to become a paramedic?"

Johnny had been mentally smiling as vultures zoomed in on the summer of Chet's malcontent,  
but now, Gage nearly spit out the mouthful of coffee he had been swallowing. "What?! "

Babble followed instantly.  
"A medic, Chet?" Stoker parroted.  
"That's great, Chet.." Lopez said warmly.  
Cap's face animated in surprise. "Wow, that's news there, Kelly. What made you suddenly decide this?"  
Roy even perked up a little."Really?"

Chet tried to quell them all with shushes and self conscious hand waves. "Gimme a sec, gimme a second here. Let Johnny answer my question first, eh, guys? All right..? Then I'll let you have at it.."

Everyone obeyed instantly, all ears and expectant,  
as they all looked at Johnny.

Including Henry.

Gage cleared his throat uncomfortably inside the circle of faces surrounding his. "Uh, well.. Chet. You see, uh.. Wow, Gee. I don't know where to begin.." He started over on a different track. "You seem like a pretty good firefighter and I like working with ya and all. But quite frankly, I haven't actually, ever considered this idea before, you know.  
I think you'd--"

The alarm tones went off.

======================== ##Station 51. Possible drowning. L.A. Riverbed.  
One half mile north of Vadnais Heights Boulevard.  
One half mile north of Vadnais Heights Boulevard.  
Time out, 8: 02#

In the garage, Cap thumbed the response mike and replied. "This is station 51, 10-4. KMG 365."

And he threw on his turnout coat and beat a hasty pace to the LaFrance.

------------------------------------------------

On scene, a lone hiker, muddied despite the clear day, met them on the roadside margin. He seemed highly agitated. "Glad you got here so fast. Hurry.  
I couldn't get down there any closer. Uh, man.."  
he gasped.

"What do you got?"Cap fired at him as he stepped out of the truck's cab.

"Well, I couldn't believe what I was looking at.  
I couldn't believe my eyes at first." he panted.  
"I just couldn't believe it was really a--"  
The biker suddenly turned green and Johnny and Roy had to catch him when he stopped speaking and when his knees started to buckle.

"Whoa, whoa.. now take it easy. Hey. You feeling all right?" Johnny said. "Here, set him over against the squad." He and Roy and Cap managed to get the man sitting on the wet ground. Stoker went for the O2.

Gage said to Cap. "I got him. Looks like it's a syncopal episode. His pulse's normal."

"Cap, I'll go looking around. Maybe I can find out something.." Roy said, readjusting his helmet.

"You do that. Marco, Chet, go with him." Cap said.  
He pulled out his walkie talkie. "L.A. This is Engine 51. Send an ambulance to our location. We've a man down."

##10-4, 51. Time out 8:14.##

Marco, Chet and Roy headed into the brush rimming the man made channel of the L.A. river.

The bed was partially filled with a fast flow,  
and it was clogged with many many downed trees and debris from the flooding of the day before.

Then they spotted an orange hiker's pack and mountain bike and an abandoned CB radio lying on the ground.

"This is where he must have made our rescue call..." Roy said. "Let's assume he spotted something straight down from here." And he waved Chet and Marco along with him down the next decline.

They skidded over the slope of the final levee to the top of the drop off leading into the concrete river system and crawled on their bellies until they were able to see beyond down into the waterway.

Marco gasped.

A horribly mangled little girl lay twisted in the bows of a flooded eucalyptus tree with skin so dusky, that there was no doubt that the life signs in her had fled long ago.  
One arm was broken hideously over her head and the crushed torso was wearing a very familar set of school colors.

"Oh, my g*d. It's her.." Kelly heard from Roy.

"What?" Chet asked. "This is who, Roy?"  
he asked through a scrub bush, separating them.

But Roy just stood there, dropping his walkie talkie from limp fingers.

Chet and Marco didn't see him falter,  
still being partially hidden in the overgrown field.

"Come on, Marco. Let's get closer.."  
Kelly said, moments later.

Through the brush, Chet called out again as Marco and he struggled to get nearer the area where they saw the little girl's remains."Roy.. we need to know what you know." Kelly said over the roar of water. "There are parents somewhere out there looking for this little girl. If you know something we don't, y--"

They heard DeSoto sob a heart rending incomprehensible outburst, quickly followed by sudden violent retching. Kelly and Lopez heard the thud of something with weight, fall onto the dry reeds above the river, seconds later.

Kelly and Lopez turned from the water,  
not understanding for a moment. They both were shocked when they jogged back the way they had come to see Roy curled up into a ball on the ground. He was on his side, getting sick and trying to hide the fact that his stomach battle had been lost in what seemed to Chet, a pitiful way.

"Roy, pull yourself together man. It's ok.  
We'll just get her in a few when you're better and we'll just get the h*ll out of here.."  
Kelly said.

Lopez said. "I don't think this is just a grossing out, Chet. I mean, this is ROY. He never lets things like this bother him. Something's really not right here."

"You deal with it. I gotta let Cap know what's going on."  
Chet said defensively. His face was a mixture of worry, disgust and frustration. Kelly went to find some high ground to report to the engine crew.

Marco went to Roy's side and pulled him away from the soiling ground. He helped Roy kneel upright and Lopez held him while he continued to empty his stomach. His heaves were so violent, that his chin strap loosened and DeSoto's helmet flopped forward over his eyes.

Marco took off Roy's helmet and threw it some distance up the hill in frustration and anger over the second unexpected horror delivered to them yet again in as many days.  
He waited until Roy was through gagging, then he said. "Come on, Roy. Let's move away. We're too near the edge."

Kelly pulled out his HT. "Cap. We've got a Code F.  
It's a ... it's a ...kid from the bus rescue. Roy recognized her right away."

##Would you 10-9 that, Kelly. A Code F from yesterday?## Cap queried.

"That's affirmative, Cap. And she's retrievable."

There was a long silence. ##All right. Listen.  
This is first. Our hiker informant's a diabetic and the stress of his calling us out here has set off a metabolic crisis. Have Roy come up here.##

"Ah, Cap. That won't be possible."

##Kelly? What's the hold up?##

"Just get down here, Cap. On the double." Kelly said and he flicked the walkie talkie's speaker off, his face fighting powerful emotions.

-------------

Marco had gotten Roy's collar loose. He saw that DeSoto was no longer getting ill in the place Marco had guided him to away from the river's wall. But things were far from improving. Roy lay, pale and in denial, on his side, sobbing uncontrollably.

Lopez patted his shattered coworker on the shoulder. "It's ok. Just take it 'll take it from here. Your nausea passing?"

He got only a moaning half cry for a reply.

Lopez moved Roy's head to his knees to keep the sharp grassy brambles from cutting his face. "I know it. Just let it pass. You don't have to do anything right now."

Cap and Stoker came skidding through the undergrowth fully loaded with ropes, a metal grappling hook, and a small folded body bag between them.

They halted in shock at the sight of Roy, curled fetal, going to pieces.

Kelly and Marco didn't have to explain anything to them at all when Hank saw the little girl they had seen. His own face twisted in pain.

Cap crouched by Roy and added his own comforting hand to DeSoto's shoulder. "Easy, pal.  
You don't have to do this at all. We'll handle it.  
Marco, stay with him for a moment. "  
And he rose back onto his feet. Cap swallowed. He motioned to Mike.  
"Stoker, get her down from there." His eyes never left the dead child's place in the partially submerged tree. "We're not losing her again." and he handed off all his gear to the engineer. "Kelly, go back up the hill and help Johnny any way you can. You're taking over for Roy."

"R- Right.." and Chet bounded up the hill. "Roy, you get yourself ok.. You hear me.." he said as he disappeared.  
Chet stumbled once but then got to the highway a few seconds later.

After a notification to L.A. for a morgue team and the D.A.'s office, Cap shooed Marco off to help Stoker recover the tiny pitiful body.

Hank closed his eyes and made sure Roy didn't see their awkward retrieval using the hook either, by screening out DeSoto's sight of it with his captain's helmet.

It could have been ten minutes or ten years later to Stanley when it was finally done.

The morning sun was a little bit higher in the brilliant sky, a few minutes later. Hank began to speak quietly to his heart wounded friend, sharing a like story of when his own shell had finally cracked under strain in honor of a dead child's memory. It did little to lessen Roy's grief. He still shook, gasping like a fish, no longer able to voice sounds.  
Cap sighed compassionately and softly, he whispered. "Roy. We're all here for ya. It's ok. Just let it out." and he drew his senior crewman up into a hug.

Stanley let him cry for a long time.

Privately, Cap let down a shadow of his past grief .  
He allowed tears of his own to fill his chocolate eyes. Silently, unchecked, they fell onto his jacket, rolled off its hem, and into the L.A. river below.

-  
Gage looked up impatiently as Chet knelt where the hiker now lay. He was irritatedly biting the IV Dex bag covering off on the solution he had been ordered to give the downed hiker. "Here. Get this set up."  
he said thrusting the IV into Chet's hands.  
"Where'd you all go to? Took forever getting him to settle down. Fortunately, he's deep into diabetic crisis now and no longer seizing."

Kelly was quiet.

Johnny didn't even think to guess the reason why. He asked. "Where's Roy? We gotta get this man NPA intubated yesterday."And he began to take another hasty BP on their victim.

"He's not coming." Chet said, stringing the IV tubing and stabbing its port valve lance into the bag he had set between his knees.

"What do ya mean he's not coming?" Gage snapped.  
"We've got a major medical here. He oughta know any body we find's last priority." Johnny said, pulling the stethoscope out of his ears.

Chet held Johnny's hand that was holding the IV needle still for a moment, to get his full attention.  
"Johnny, Roy cracked. Cap's down there now deciding whether or not to stretcher him outta there."

"What?! Chet, you must be talking crazy..."

"Wish I was, Johnny boy. I hope to g*d I was.  
Anything,.. but the bad scene I just witnessed down there."

Gage fought mentally with himself, warring over his care of the hiker and his own desire to whip out his HT to demand of Cap how Roy was doing.  
He attempted to console himself with trying to peer over the side of the steep grassy embankment. The next words out of his mouth were barely audible.. "Is he awake?"

"What, ....this guy?" Chet asked, looking down,  
beginning to do a pain stimulus check.

Gage gripped his hand and stopped him.  
"No, I'm talking about Roy.."

"Oh. Yeah, he is. But he lost his breakfast,.. and maybe last night's dinner, too. Johnny, he's not even standing."

"Gonna get shocky." Gage mumbled to himself,  
suddenly redirected.

"Roy?"

"No, our victim here. Chet, pay attention."  
Gage said angrily. "This next step's gonna be tricky. Now lube this NPA down with the K-Jelly. I've already measured this to be the right size airway. And get that positive pressure handy.  
His lack of glucose is gonna knock out his respirations something fierce."

"Gage I don't know about this.." Chet said.  
"Maybe you'd better call in another sq-"

Johnny grabbed Chet by his jacket lapels and snatched him close until he was only inches away from his face.  
"You wanted to know if I thought you were medic material? Medic trainees follow orders INSTANTLY from their senior trainers and they never EVER second guess a medical order.  
I ordered you to prepare that NPA tube.  
Even told you how to do it. So do it! Now!" and he let his overcoat go.

"Geez, all right already. I'm just as worried about Roy as you are. No need to beat me up over it. You'll have ta tell me more on what to do here though. Been rocky ever since I've been ordered to take over to help ya in Roy's place."

Gage glared at him and arrowed his spent IV needle into free flight, not caring that the bloody thing whistled by only a centimeter from Chet's ear as it clattered home into the drug box's waste needle catch bin.  
"You've got thirty seconds.. I'm not repeating myself."

"Ah,, Ok.. ok.. which side..?" Chet said,  
positioning the end of the soft nasopharyngeal airway near the hiker's nasal passages.

"Try the left side nare first. Don't force it."

Chet nimbly got it into place, doing all the right moves and techniques, sending the airway down flat, along the palate as it should have been done.

Johnny smiled, handing Chet the positive pressure mask. "See, you HAVE been watching us.  
You'll still have to keep his head back for a clear airway and be prepared to yank it out if he vomits."

"That much I remember Gage. What now?"  
Chet said. "He's breathing fine." he said, letting the man pull his own oxygen off the mask.

"What's his rate?" Gage said, adjusting the D5W flow into the man's veins.

"Ten, and slowing."

"You know to ventilate him if he slips below eight a minute?"

"Yeah."

"What's his color?" he said, drawing a blood vial for a glucose check, for Rampart.

Chet peeled away the man's oddly sunburned lips until he saw his gums. "Pink. Look Johnny.  
I could go back down there now and see how Roy's doing for ya you know. You are in charge of me up here.."

It was tempting but Johnny knew his responsibilities.  
"Nice try. But we're gonna have to trust the other guys' judgement on that. Roy's probably just reacting now because he didn't react yesterday.  
It's most likely no big deal."

"You didn't see him, Gage.." Chet said in the tiniest of voices. It was full of fear.

Johnny looked up, his attention full and frightened.

-  
Cap heard a voice call out. It was Stoker's.  
"Ready to move, Cap."

It must have been some minutes later, for when Hank blinked, he saw the black body bag nestled in a scoop stokes that Marco had retrieved from the engine. The bundle was already tied and rope tethered for a hill climb back up to the roadway.

Roy, was now some feet away, dry eyed, sitting and hugging his knees to his chest, with his back to the body, staring out at the brightly sunlit flowing river bed below.

"Stoker, you and Lopez go on ahead. Have Johnny go on alone in the ambulance with the hiker if you have to and tell Chet to take in the squad. Roy's coming with us." Hank told Mike. "But, you're giving us two, a minute or so alone. Get me only if Johnny needs another rescue squad to finish the transport, and when you're done picking up after yourselves.  
Tell the detectives whatever they need to know. I'm out of service for a bit. Understood?"

"Right, Cap." and the dry crackle of the grass told Stanley that the grisly trip up had begun. Soon, even that soft rustling faded away.

The ambulance came, then went, with the squad behind it. Soon, even those sounds fell into the distance too. Not long after, the mortuary wagon and an unmarked detective car pulled up, to take away the child's body and to learn the information necessary for the bus investigation from Marco and Stoker.

Hank's talkie came to life. ##Engine 51, to HT 51.  
All the gear's stowed. Want us to put the Engine available?"##

Hank lifted up his talkie and said. "When we're base bound, Engine 51."

##10-4, HT 51.## came Lopez's reply. And the station frequency fell silent.

Rubbing his mouth, Cap could see Mike and Marco watching them from where they sat in the idling engine cab, waiting. He flashed them an okay sign without radioing back. He saw them visibly relax.

Cap sat by Roy, not directly looking at him, as he took in the same spectacular view of the valley over the concrete river bed that Roy seemed to be looking at. He took in a deep breath of the canyon's sweet, spicy air. "Hear that, Roy? The birds are still singing..."

Roy swung red, swollen eyes towards him. "Hear what, Cap? All I hear are the sounds of all those school kids, screaming, as that hill came down on top of them. I just wanna know why it had to happen. That's all.  
Is that too much for a guy to ask for?"  
But Roy didn't cry again. His face remained only dusty and flushed.

Cap handed DeSoto back his helmet and slowly put on his own. "Come on, let's go."  
he said, grabbing a hold of Roy's gloved hand to pull him to his feet. "We'll take the engine home."

DeSoto clasped Cap's dirty hand numbly,  
and then used its strong steady leverage until he stood. Cap watched Roy put on his helmet only after he seemed to contemplate the purpose for which it stood for long, unseeing moments. Then he saw Roy sigh a lengthy quavering breath. Roy's face was now a little less pale but his voice was weaker than a baby's.  
He murmured. "Yeah. Let's get outta here."

Cap, threw a stokes blanket around Roy's shoulders and together, they went up the hill to the road.

-----------------------------------------------------

Photo : Marco feeding Henry goodies on the couch.

Photo : Roy looking sick, in the sun.

Photo : Children covered in mud in a pond.

*  
Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2003 10:34:05 -0800 (PST) From: "Patti or Jeff or Cassidy" Subject: Come Uppance...

It was four hours after the L.A. river call.

Marco Lopez looked up from where he was dishing out chow for Henry. The longish hound was snuffling excitedly as the Rival can of dog food filled his chrome dish. All the guys were watching him get worked up. And some of them even had their fingers crossed for luck while Marco finished.

Stoker, ignoring their "sport", was the first to see Cap enter the kitchen. "How's he doing, Cap?"

"Roy? Still resting. I did order him to take a nap. And yes, I explained to Joanne what happened and then called the crisis counselor just a few minutes ago. She's coming for a station visit, and she's towing along Roy's wife. They'll one to one with him first and then we'll get our session over dinner as planned." Hank announced. He knelt and petted Henry as the dog licked his lips in anticipation of supper.

"That's good. Maybe ..having Joanne around will help Roy get back his equilibrium." Kelly said thoughtfully, arching his balled up snack napkin into a wide shot for the trash bin. It landed perfectly.

"I know it will." Cap said empathetically, rubbing some dust out of his nose.

The gang fell to the moment as the salty scent of horsemeat filled the air. "Do it Lopez.." Stoker said with anticipation. "This time it's gotta work."

Marco carefully set down the dish gingerly, as if jarring it would cause Henry to lose interest.  
"There you go, Henry. Dive in."

The slowish hound looked up, licked Marco's face,  
jumped down from the leather couch, almost on top of the food bowl, and then he kept right on truckin forward and straight out the kitchen door.

"Hey, where are you going ya crazy mutt?!" Kelly said from where he was sipping coffee at the kitchen table. "What a schmo...Geez, that's two cans of grub now, slated for the trash can.."

Hank only chuckled. "You forgot Henry's a true station dog there, Kelly." Cap grinned. "Can't you see he's making a house call? It's more important than food to him."

"Yeah, Chet. He does it all the time whenever one of us is feeling out of it." Marco said, retucking his shirt in around his belt. He had just come out of the shower.

Johnny neatly rose to his feet, abandoning his coffee mug. "That's my cue.. Excuse me guys. I'm right on Henry's angle.." and Gage, too, exited the kitchen for the bunk dorms. On a second thought,  
he grabbed a couple of donuts on the way out,  
one for him and a second one for Roy.

Gage noticed that Cap had pulled all the shades down around Roy's bunk and had even set a water pitcher on the desk tabletop with a paper already opened to the horse racing section next to it.

Gage smiled when he heard Roy stir in his sheets to play with Henry. Respectfully, he knocked on the wooden doorframe first before he entered the room further. "Roy?"

"Yeah, Johnny. I'm awake.." his partner said.  
"Didn't anybody feed Henry yet? He's acting like he wants his bowl now."

Gage walked into the room and grabbed the chair from the desk, inverted it, and straddled it to sit. "Now, Roy, you know Henry won't eat for anyone else but you. And we're dumb enough to keep forgetting that. He turned his finicky nose up again at Marco just a minute ago when he opened a can right under his face. You sure got a way with dogs."

Roy's face unexpectedly fell at Johnny's comment.  
and he stopped petting Henry's broad back.  
"Yeah, well. I wish I had a way with children right about now. Lately my luck's been running kinda dry."

Johnny scoffed gently. "Now what's that supposed to mean? You got two wonderful kids who're incredibly proud to call ya dad. You got a beautiful wife.  
That's more than what I got. What more can a man want?"

"To turn back the clock for starters. How about turning it back about..oh,...forty eight hours or so.  
Then I'd truly be a happy man, Johnny." Roy said, with a groan. He flopped back onto his back and drew his sheets up to his chest as if chilled suddenly in his T shirt and boxers.

"Roy, cut it out. You shouldn't be ashamed of your emotions. What happened out there today,  
happens to all of us. H*ll, Cap's been there. He just told us when and why over coffee a few minutes ago. And I bet if we took a poll, we'd find that there isn't a single guy on the rosters who hasn't been in the same shoes you wore this morning." Johnny said. "I'm not immune either. I've been there.  
Remember? I lost it only two weeks into the paramedic program.."

Roy regarded Gage quietly for long seconds,  
"Not everyone, Johnny." A slight smile curled his lips, "What about Craig Brice?"  
"Oh, yeah.." Johnny chuckled. "Brice. Forgot about him. How can a man without sense of humor find something about our line of work that'll make him lose his lunch? Brice sure can't. He's an Iron Man." Johnny grumbled, answering his own question. "Maybe he should team up with Detello at ten's for a while and learn something about compassion." Johnny took a bite from his donut, then belated remembered that he had already bitten into the first one. Lamely, he offered the pastry to Roy.

DeSoto took it, and began offering the pieces wearing Johnny's tooth marks to the snuffling Henry who had sprawled his heavy weight across Roy's legs. "Here, buddy.  
Yeah, that's a good boy.." and he smacked Henry's hide loudly in affection. The rest, he popped into his mouth.

"Nausea finally gone?" Johnny asked.

Roy looked up, almost as if he had forgotten his partner was there. "Yeah, that anti-emetic you gave me worked." he said chewing slowly. "Who authorized that?"

"Joe Early. He knew what you had been up against yesterday. And understood the need for the hypo today."

"Does everybody know about ...what happened to me?"  
Roy asked quietly, caressing Henry's ear as the dog snoozed in his lap.

"Only those who care a whip about ya." Gage quipped.  
Then he leaned forward, lacing his fingers together.  
"Listen, Roy, so what if it took six years for you to finally crack on a call. Big deal. You're a human being. It means that you care.."

"Yeah, maybe I care a little too much." Roy said softly.

Johnny rubbed his mouth in frustration and then he got angry."Oh, boy, here we go again. You didn't make that driver hit the bus. You didn't cause that canyon wall to come caving in on us. And unless you're really Moses,  
I know you didn't cause that rain storm to flood us out like it did. So knock off the pity pit.  
A paramedic's GOT to have empathy. H*ll. You're the one who taught me that.." he sat back with exasperation.

Roy was silent for a time. Then he said.  
"I'm thinking about leaving the program Johnny. I really think I can't hack it any more."  
he pointed to the uniform that Cap had folded neatly on the dresser and said. "I really don't know if I can ever get myself to wear that uniform again. Ever. It now hurts too much.."  
and his lip quavered.

Johnny showed no sympathy.  
"You're just saying that. Now what would I do in a few months if Kelly kept good on his threat and suddenly became my new partner?"  
Johnny asked drily.

Roy finally smiled and laughed. "You two'd probably, most likely kill each other the first week out."

"There ya go.." Johnny said. "So don't leave me in that kind of spot. And quit talkin like that. You're just hurting, that's all. You're not disabled. A little time taken with the family will make it all right again."

"Now you're sounding like Cap." Roy said.

"Good, cause he's right. And that's what he said worked for him when he cracked over his own child call."

Roy sat up. "You know something Gage?"

"What..?" Gage said, curling Henry's tail and scratching its white furred tip until Henry picked up his head to see who was messing with it. Henry's tail started wagging when he saw who it was.

"You're right. M- Maybe that's all I'll need.  
A little time off. Just enough ta.. get my clear thinking back again and maybe I'll even find that sense of inner balance that I had before.. "  
he said, grinning.

"That's the ticket.." Johnny beamed, taking another bite out of his donut.

"No, wait a minute, I can't go on leave."

"Why not? You got enough vacation time coming to ya. As long as I've known ya, you've only been on vacation twice. Once to Santa Rosa with me, and the other time when you took Joanne and the kids to the f--" he broke off.

"You can say it, Johnny. Farm. I'm not mad at you over that any more. I mean who can control circumstance?"

"And that's it right there, Roy. On your coming days off, hold that thought and you think about it, real hard.." With that, Gage disappeared, leaving the rest of his donut abandoned on the bedspread.

Roy blinked, amazed that Johnny could move so fast. And that, in itself, made him think all the more about Roy DeSoto. Johnny's cool advice and Henry's warm tongue on his fingers, made him mull over what was really the most important thing going on in his life apart from his family.

Sighing, Roy picked up the donut and began doling out the correct pieces to the proper mouths. Then, feeling thirsty, he reached for the water container.

And a bit later, after a long tearful talk with the crisis counselor and Joanne,....

...Roy DeSoto reached for his uniform..

----------------------------------------------

It was a week later. And the gang on A shift finally felt like they were a whole crew again.

Roy DeSoto was back on the job.

But Gage sighed and didn't even turn around when he felt Roy sit on the locker room bench next to him and opened his locker.

"Mornin.." Roy said cheerily. He broke off into a jaunty whistling tune. One he knew would irritate Johnny.

Gage didn't reply. He just changed in silence.

"What's the problem, Johnny? An explosion knock out your ears or something? I'm back."

"Good for you Roy. I'm proud ya made the right decision." Johnny said finally. "But frankly,  
I'm really depressed right now if you have to know."

"Why? Got a reason to be?"

"Yeah. A good one. Guess who replaced you while you and Joanne and the kids were having it up in Florida."

"No, ..don't tell me..."

"Yeah.. Craig Brice.." Johnny said putting on his work shoes. He was so worked up, that he broke a shoelace.

Roy was kind enough not to laugh and wordlessly,  
he handed his partner a package of new ones that he knew Johnny hadn't had the foresight to buy from the drugstore.

"Thanks." Johnny said and he unlaced the old and did up the replacement deftly. "I'll tell you why else I'm depressed. We had a new trainee."  
"Chet didn't.." Roy interjected, his eyes getting real big.

"No, .." Johnny sighed. "Chet didn't. He got an earful of just what kinds of things we paramedics go through from Detello and company and chickened out on taking any ride alongs. That delayed him enough that he blew his chance to train in the field this quarter with a squad. He's gonna have to wait until next year to enroll if he's still interested since the next batch of classes have already begun." Johnny said.

"Then why are you so glum? You didn't have your paramedic partner trainee from h*ll." Roy asked.

"I had a new .... " and he sighed. "..GIRL trainee. And you'll never guess who it was."

"Who?"

"Brice's cousin."

"Brice has a cousin?"

"Yeah, and she's nearly as bossy and analytical as he is. Why, we weren't even ten feet out the door on our first run, when she suddenly started quoting rules and regs at me. Said my helmet was too big."

"It is. Didn't you learn your lesson when it fell off your head after that monkey virus got to you on that scaffoulding?" Roy said drolly.

Johnny blinked. "Would ya look at that. Hey guys.  
Would ya look at that?!" he shouted through the kitchen door. "My best bud, my partner to whom I entrust life and limb, agrees with the comments from that annoying probie!!"

Naturally, there was no reply from the gang in the kitchen.

"You couldn't have been suffering that badly last week, Johnny.."

"Oh, really. Pray tell why..."

"Henry's not here.." and Roy closed his locker door calmly and left for breakfast.

------------------------------------------------

They had just about finished the pancakes when a station call came out.  
##Station 51, Station 10, Truck 127. Battalion 14. ......School fire at Roosevelt Elementary....##

Roy's heart skipped a beat. "Oh no.. Not again."

Johnny said as he snatched up his jacket.  
"Roy, now you're gonna do just fine. It's most likely just a false alarm again. Now, come on,  
let's go.."

##....13000 Technology Drive. 13000 Technology Drive.  
Cross street, Maple. Time out, 9:57.##

"L.A., 10-4. This is Station 51. KMG 365." Stoker replied in communications acknowledgement.

They rolled out..

---------------------------------------------------------

Photo: John sitting in a chair with Henry..

Photo: Roy in closeup, asleep.

Photo : Roy driving the squad, looking right at you.

*  
From: "Roxy Dee" Date: Wed Jan 15, 2003 5:44 pm Subject: The Call of Angels~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Station 51 pushed the envelope to arrive on on scene. As it was, they were the first.

A stumbling, smoke stained janitor ran out of the building and was met by a throng of teachers who were trying to control their classrooms of children calmly and collectively. They caught him as he fell and lowered him to the ground.

One moustached balding superintendant grabbed him by the arms."Charlie! Now that was plumb stupid.  
The building's clear. You didn't have to go back in there. No boiler's valuable enough for that."

Charlie, silver haired and Asian, just coughed, gripping his chest. "Yes... I ...did...sir. The water heater and the gas line's the next room over.. If they go.. The northside classrooms are still evacuating Aghh.. My chest!!" and he gasped, then gurgled.

The superintendant heard sirens and looked up to see a fire department rescue squad screech to a halt on the street a safe distance away from the school.

Gage and DeSoto stepped out to the nearest bunch of teachers. Frightened kids milled about everywhere.  
"What's the situation here?" Johnny asked one of them.

The young substitute teacher said. "There's a fire in the basement. Boiler room according to Charlie.  
There's a lot of chemicals stored in there."

Johnny ran along to the cab and shouted to Cap and the gang who had just pulled up the red pumper, spewing long hose. "Cap! Substructure.  
And chemicals!"

"I want everybody in full SCBA! " Cap waved on Vince and two other police cars to begin crowd control. Then he contacted L.A. through his hand held radio. "L.A. We've got smoke showing from a two story brick building. Assign a third alarm assignment."

##10-4, 51. ## And the fire captain heard the dispatcher assign two other stations to the call.

Then a teacher ran up to Cap and hung onto his arm. "Listen. They're still people trying to get out on the north side. And we've a man hurt!"  
she said.

"Where?"

"He's in the parking lot.." she coughed.

"You ok, maam?" Cap said.

"I'm fine. Just a little smoke. I gotta get back to my kids.." she shouted and fled his grip.

Cap looked around and saw Gage and DeSoto already air bottled and connecting hose to the yellow hydrants on the block. "Gage!  
DeSoto! There's a victim over there. Check it out!"

He saw his men look up and see where he was pointing.

Then he called for four ambulances judging from the number of coughing kids he could see crying and sitting on the curbsides.

Johnny and Roy abandoned what they were doing to grab their medical gear.

Chet and Marco took over their task of charging the hoses.

Johnny grabbed the O2 and the biophone while Roy got the drug and IV boxes.  
"Cap! We're on it.."

They soon found the superintendant with Charlie the janitor, who was now unconscious.  
Johnny reached for the man's neck. "Thready. Might be his heart."

The superintendant nodded. "He did say his chest hurt him. I guess he was in the fire too long.."

"I'll patch him in.." Roy said, unbuttoning the man's shirt while Johnny set him on some oxygen. He looked up while he fastened the EKG leads to the janitor's chest. "Listen, sir.. Do you know if everybody made it out?"

The superintendant, distracted by the melee of panicking children and teachers just mumbled. "I- I don't know. I.. some of the staff seems to think the classrooms on the north side were still trying to make it out."

Roy made a decision.. "Johnny. I can't wait.  
You got things here?"

Gage looked up from the BP he was taking on the man. His face filled with doubt about Roy's plans but then he nodded when his ears picked up the sound of Station Ten pulling up into the smoky school yard. "Bring someone with you.."

"Cap, I'm going in to help with the evacuation!"  
DeSoto called out.

"Grab a man from 10!" Cap said, waving him on while he filled Battalion Fourteen in on the situation.

Roy ran to the open aired engine just pulled up.  
He waved the station's medics on, "A heart case,  
near the basketball court..Johnny's with him now.  
Go. Move.. We have all the gear you'll need."

10 's paramedics ran.

Then he tapped the nearest fireman's shoulder from the bunch pulling hose from the fire engine. The big man turned around. It was Detello.

"Well, if it isn't DeSoto. What's up?, er, besides the obvious.." he said with a fleeting smile. But already he was all business.

"Evac.. on the north side, Come on..!" Roy said.

Detello took his cue from the men from 51 running around with air bottles and he took his own, with an axe and door markers. On a thought, he grabbed an asbestos blanket.

"What's with that?" Roy asked as they ran towards the smoking building.

"Just a hunch, Roy. Can't explain it."

DeSoto and Detello put on their face masks and entered the building. They arrived just in time to help one last teacher make it to the sunlight.  
Detello gave her some air through his mask as they helped her to her kids in the clearer air.

They set her on the ground. "Just keep breathing a few on this.." Detello told her. "You'll be fine."

The young teacher pulled it away. "I'm missing Cindy. Oh my g*d."

A stab ran through Roy's stomach and his world dimmed. He looked up at the building from which flames now rose and a chemical stench. ::Ammonia..::

He heard Detello question the woman and soon,  
they got hasty directions to that classroom.

The big firefighter waved over an arriving fire station to take care of the woman and he and DeSoto put back on their masks and helmets and both ran back to the door they had just gone through getting out. Detello still carried the asbestos blanket, like a football.

Roy smacked Detello's arm. "Which way?"

"Left! Down the hall. First room on the right by the stairwell. Watch the right. It's a door leading to the sub basement. Bound to be hot!"

Roy got on his hand radio and told the Batallion station they were searching for a victim and where.

They entered a third grade class room which was barely visible in the smoke. "Hey! can anybody hear me!" Detello shouted.

Roy and he searched and upturned desks hastily, crouching low enough to the floor so they could see their boots and any body they might find.

The heat, was oppressive and they could hear the sizzle in the air from the leaking ammonia creating thicker gases and smoke near the ceiling.

The noise of flames and the alarm bells forced Detello and Roy to use hand signals to communicate while they searched both that classroom and the next. Roy paused at each door and closed it,  
after marking it with a search slash when they were through.

"She couldn't have gone far.. The exit's right there.."  
Roy said in frustration through his mask.

Detello's head snapped around at a sound only he heard and he pushed Roy back into the lockers and brought both of them down to the stone tiles in the hallway.

There was a huge explosion that ripped through the sub basement and blew out all the classroom windows of the school.

Cap looked up, waving on Stoker and Marco, Chet and a man from ten's. "Take two inch and a halfs! Get where Roy and Detello are searching!"

Johnny Gage came running up and Cap seemed surprised. Johnny shrugged. "Squad Ten took him in.  
I'm no longer needed. Where do you want me?"

"Go with them!" Stanley gestured, pointing out the hoses writhing on the wet pavement from his men's hose teams.

Johnny fled, fastening on his air mask. He knew what was going on and held his radio near his ear. Soon, he heard the staticky tones of a call button being pressed in a series of three tones. "They're all right." he gasped, slapping Chet's back as he and the others got a powerful covering fan into the building to begin to combat the inferno. "They just ran a three on the radio."

Chet gave him a thumbs up and together, the group stormed the building. The smoke was thick and the fire belched out of cracks in the neat brown marble floor. The firemen played water onto these fissures and steam rose, obscuring their view. Slowly, they advanced northwards.

Detello hauled Roy to his feet and pulled off the asbestos blanket he had thrown over on top of them. The paint on the lockers around them were melted and dripping. "Let's go, irishman." Detello grinned toothily at him. "We won't be needed this anymore." he said and he tossed down the smoking ruin of the blanket which had saved them from the worst of the explosion. "I'm feeling like that's the worst of it."

Roy shook his hand and turned where he stood. They resumed their room by room search. Then Roy halted Detello by tapping him on the back. "It's really hot in here. If it was hot, and I was a child, where would I go in a fire?"

Detello and Roy both exclaimed. "The restrooms."

They doubled back to the third grade class room and the stairwell, which was now fully involved.  
They met Chet and Marco and took a welcome spray onto their jackets before pressing on with a "We're ok." hand signal.

There was door barely concealed underneath the stairwell.  
Detello pointed to it. "Hit this! Hit this!" Marco and Chet snuffed out the tendrils of flame beginning to threaten that entryway and it died with a hiss.

Roy kicked in the door. It was a faculty bathroom.  
"Hey.. Anybody in here?"

Detello never got into the room when the ceiling came down, separating them. The flaming stairwell soon followed, and it trapped Roy away from Chet and Marco and Detello.

The three on the outside frantically began to hose down the surging fire blocking the door.  
"Roy! You ok in there?!"

Roy had flattened himself against the smooth tile wall and he felt hot moisture on his face.  
"That's not from the hose.." he mumbled.  
and his gloves sank into a dark section of the room. The showers! One of them was on. He dragged out a flashlight and scrambled on his hands and knees towards the sound of the running water.

There he found the little girl, lying motionless beneath its stream.

He grabbed her by the shoulders and picked her up into his arms and carried her back into the main part of the bathroom where the daylight from the skylight let him see the child he held.

He pulled off his helmet and mask and crouched down against the wall with her,  
checking. "Come on, honey. Just take a breath.." She didn't.

Roy began mouth to mouth. He couldn't tell if she had a pulse because she was twisted up so badly in the sweater soaked from the shower. Roy fumbled until he found one. He laid her down on a sink,  
onto her back, for a moment while he worked to keep her going.  
In between another set of breaths, Roy got up and grabbed a steel waste can and used it to smash out the tiny thick, textured bathroom window leading to the outside. Shouts of attention from the firecrews manned there reassured him that someone now knew he was trapped right there,  
with a victim.

He returned to the child, taking her into his arms and stretched her out onto the glass sharded floor. He alternatingly took breaths off his own mask to give to her using his own lungpower to keep the ammonia tainted air out of her system. He pulled out his radio. "Kelly, Lopez. Hurry it up! Now would be a good time!"

Images flashed through Roy's mind of the bus crash. The wet and the dark. It felt very much like where he was now. And the tiny living weight of the girl he fought to save was so like the feel of the girl from the storm drain as the water tore her away from his grasp.  
Roy began to cry, shouting. "Come on.  
Cindy. Come back. It's ok.. I got you.." he sobbed.

He again, breathed for the tiny girl from his air supply. He kept burning shards from landing on her clothes and he curled about her, using the wet on the floor to put out the small blazes burning around them.

Then, there was a gasp, small, choking.

Cindy began to cough, then to cry..

Roy held her close. "It's ok. I'm a fireman.  
We're going to get you out of here.  
Keep breathing from this mask ok?" he told her. "I'll be right back.."

The frightened girl nodded.

Roy's relief was palpable. He rose from the floor and went to the doorway where he saw Chet and Marco's hose water extinguishing the fire. Soon, there was nothing but sooty insulation and wood beams between them. Detello kicked these away.

"Found her?" he asked, pulling off his mask.

"Yeah.. She's ok.." Roy said, staggering against the wall.

Detello's eyebrows went up. "Smart idea using the showers to keep the fire off."

"It was her idea.." Roy grinned.

Detello lifted both the air bottle and the girl from the ground and saw Cindy looking up and coughing at him in confusion and fright.

Then he looked at Roy.  
"I believe you have a rescue to complete." he said, grinning through the ash on his face.

Gently, he set the tiny girl into Roy's arms for him to guard. Then he stormed back out through the blackened doorway out to Kelly and Marco. "Chet, Lopez! Give us some cover. We're coming out!!"

And soon, they did.

Roy felt the sunlight on his face and the world narrowed down to just him and his tiny victim,  
still warm, alive and full of life in his arms.

He started laughing as Detello roared his displeasure at the crowds standing between him and where the squad's equipment was parked. Just like that, Roy's nightmare,  
was over.. "Come on, Cindy. Let's get you checked out. My name's Roy DeSoto and I'm a paramedic with the L. A. County Fire Department. You're gonna be just fine..."

Gage met them with fresh O2 and a live biophone and together, Roy and his partner made sure that one tiny life,  
stayed saved.

Roy thought. ::Maybe this is the feeling Detello keeps banking on. This, certainty.  
that everything that's meant to be, will always turn out for the better. I'm no angel, but right now, I certainly feel like I'm in heaven...::

Juxtaposition - FIN

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Photos : None.

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